---
title: But to-day two old sparrows and a young one answered with a "peep" a… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: But to-day two old sparrows and a young one answered with a "peep" and the thrice-repeated scrape with the left foot. 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 187

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But to-day two old sparrows and a young one answered with a "peep" and the thrice-repeated scrape with the left foot.

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**What happens:** answer, repeat · **To what, where:** young one

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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: 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:pg27200:124:187
# text = But to-day two old sparrows and a young one answered with a "peep" and the thrice-repeated scrape with the left foot.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	to	to	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
5	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	7	nummod	_	_
6	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	sparrows	sparrow	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nmod	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	conj	_	_
12	answered	answer	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	11	acl	_	_
13	with	with	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	peep	peep	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	16	punct	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
20	thrice	thrice	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	20	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	repeated	repeat	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	23	amod	_	_
23	scrape	scrape	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	conj	_	_
24	with	with	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
26	left	left	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	amod	_	_
27	foot	foot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **answer** *speech: assert* | participle |  | a young one *not said here* |  |  |  | with a peep and the thrice repeated scrape with the left foot | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **repeat** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |

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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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