---
title: He had not gone far before he met an old miser: close by them stood… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: He had not gone far before he met an old miser: close by them stood a tree, and on the topmost twig sat a thrush singing away most joyfully. Who acts: friend, wishes, thrush. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The Miser in the Bush, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of eve
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, The Miser in the Bush, sentence 17

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He had not gone far before he met an old miser: close by them stood a tree, and on the topmost twig sat a thrush singing away most joyfully.

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**Who acts:** friend, wishes, thrush · **What happens:** not go, meet, close, stand, sit, sing away · **To what, where:** old miser, tree, thrush, topmost twig

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The Miser in the Bush. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (friend, wishes, thrush), 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:pg2591:33:17
# text = He had not gone far before he met an old miser: close by them stood a tree, and on the topmost twig sat a thrush singing away most joyfully.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
4	gone	go	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	4	advmod	_	_
6	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	met	meet	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	_
9	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	miser	miser	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	13	punct	_	_
13	close	close	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
14	by	by	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
15	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	advcl	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
21	on	on	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
23	topmost	topmost	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	amod	_	_
24	twig	twig	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	_
25	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	conj	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	thrush	thrush	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	_
28	singing	sing	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	27	acl	_	_
29	away	away	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
30	most	most	ADV	RBS	Degree=Sup	31	advmod	_	_
31	joyfully	joyfully	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **go** | past · perfect | friend |  |  |  |  | far *property* | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **meet** | past | friend | a old miser |  |  |  |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent miser=Co-Agent |
| 3 | **close** | infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 4 | **stand** | past | wishes *= wish* | a tree |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer tree=Stimulus |
| 5 | **sit** | past | wishes *= wish* *not said here* | a thrush |  | the topmost twig |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V NP.theme PP»: agent=Agent thrush=Theme on twig=Location |
| 6 | **sing away** *speech: express* | gerund | a thrush *not said here* |  |  |  |  | away, joyfully *property* | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «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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