---
title: One would have thought that something important was going on in the… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: One would have thought that something important was going on in the duck-pond, but it was nothing after all. Who acts: something, pond. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Neighbouring Families, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Neighbouring Families, sentence 1

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One would have thought that something important was going on in the duck-pond, but it was nothing after all.

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**Who acts:** something, pond · **What happens:** think, go on, be · **To what, where:** One, duck pond, nothing · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Neighbouring Families. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (something, pond), 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:pg27200:124:1
# text = One would have thought that something important was going on in the duck-pond, but it was nothing after all.
1	One	one	PRON	PRP	PronType=Ind	4	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	aux	_	_
4	thought	think	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
5	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
6	something	something	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	9	nsubj	_	_
7	important	important	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
8	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	going	go	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	4	ccomp	_	_
10	on	on	ADP	RP	_	9	compound:prt	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
13	duck	duck	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	pond	pond	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
17	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
18	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
19	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	cop	_	_
20	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	4	conj	_	_
21	after	after	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **think** *speech: other* | would · perfect · passive |  | One |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V NP ADJ»: subject=Attribute clause=Theme |
| 2 | **go on** | past · progressive | something |  |  | the duck pond |  |  | vn occur-48.3 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme in pond=Location |
| 3 | **is a** | past | pond | nothing |  |  | after all |  | tree rules |

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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:** «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (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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