---
title: Then said the boy: ‘What a clever Elsie we have!’ and sat down by he… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Then said the boy: ‘What a clever Elsie we have!’ and sat down by her, and likewise began to howl loudly. Who acts: boy, clever Elsie. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Clever Elsie, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, Clever Elsie, sentence 25

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Then said the boy: ‘What a clever Elsie we have!’ and sat down by her, and likewise began to howl loudly.

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**Who acts:** boy, clever Elsie · **What happens:** say, have, sit down, begin, howl · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Clever Elsie. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (boy, clever Elsie), 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:pg2591:32:25
# text = Then said the boy: ‘What a clever Elsie we have!’ and sat down by her, and likewise began to howl loudly.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	2	advmod	_	_
2	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	12	punct	_	_
6	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	What	what	DET	WDT	PronType=Int	10	det	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	clever	clever	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	Elsie	Elsie	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
11	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	have	have	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	12	punct	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
17	down	down	ADP	RP	_	16	compound:prt	_	_
18	by	by	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
22	likewise	likewise	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	_
23	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
24	to	to	PART	TO	_	25	mark	_	_
25	howl	howl	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	23	xcomp	_	_
26	loudly	loudly	ADV	RB	_	25	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the boy |  |  |  | then |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **have** | present | what clever Elsie |  |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **sit down** | past | the boy *not said here* |  |  |  |  | by Elsie | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent by she=Location |
| 4 | **begin** | past |  |  |  |  |  | likewise *property* | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 5 | **howl** | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  | loudly *property* | vn animal\_sounds-38 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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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