---
title: They journeyed on till it began to be dusky, and then the little man… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: They journeyed on till it began to be dusky, and then the little man said, ‘Let me get down, I’m tired.’ Who acts: strangers, leave, little man, me. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Tom Thumb, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, Tom Thumb, sentence 32

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They journeyed on till it began to be dusky, and then the little man said, ‘Let me get down, I’m tired.’

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**Who acts:** strangers, leave, little man, me, I · **What happens:** journey, begin, be, say, let, get down · **To what, where:** me · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Tom Thumb. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (strangers, leave, little man, me), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg2591:25:32
# text = They journeyed on till it began to be dusky, and then the little man said, ‘Let me get down, I’m tired.’
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	journeyed	journey	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	on	on	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
4	till	till	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
5	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	advcl	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
8	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	cop	_	_
9	dusky	dusky	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
12	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	16	advmod	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
14	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
16	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	Let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	ccomp	_	_
20	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	_
21	get	get	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	xcomp	_	_
22	down	down	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
24	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	25	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	’m	be	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	parataxis	_	_
26	tired	tired	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **journey** | past | strangers *= stranger* |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **begin** | past | leave |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 3 | **is** | to-infinitive | leave *not said here* |  |  |  |  | dusky *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the little man |  |  |  | then |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 5 | **let** | infinitive |  | me |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 6 | **get down** | infinitive | me *not said here* |  |  |  |  | down *property* | vn convert-26.6.2 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Patient |
| 7 | **be** | present | I |  |  |  |  | tired *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Text:** «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 2591 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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