---
title: There was nothing to do but to bring out the scissors and cut the be… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: There was nothing to do but to bring out the scissors and cut the beard, whereby a small part of it was lost. Who acts: nothing. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Snow-white and Rose-red, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, Snow-white and Rose-red, sentence 69

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
There was nothing to do but to bring out the scissors and cut the beard, whereby a small part of it was lost.

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**Who acts:** nothing · **What happens:** be, do, bring out, cut, lose · **To what, where:** scissors, beard, small part

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Snow-white and Rose-red. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nothing), 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:pg2591:60:69
# text = There was nothing to do but to bring out the scissors and cut the beard, whereby a small part of it was lost.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	2	nsubj	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	acl	_	_
6	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	bring	bring	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	conj	_	_
9	out	out	ADP	RP	_	8	compound:prt	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	scissors	scissors	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	cut	cut	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	beard	beard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
17	whereby	whereby	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	24	advmod	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	small	small	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	part	part	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nsubj:pass	_	_
21	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nmod	_	_
23	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux:pass	_	_
24	lost	lose	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	15	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | nothing |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **do** | to-infinitive | nothing *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **bring out** | to-infinitive | nothing *not said here* | the scissors |  |  |  |  | vn remedy-45.7 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent scissors=Patient |
| 4 | **cut** | present | nothing *not said here* | the beard |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset beard=Product |
| 5 | **lose** | past · passive |  | a small part of beard |  |  |  | whereby *property* | vn succeed-74-3-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Eventuality |

<!-- .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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