---
title: But they still went on, and Death nodded like a Chinaman to all they… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: But they still went on, and Death nodded like a Chinaman to all they said. " Who acts: chamberlains, Death. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Nightingale, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Nightingale, sentence 126

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But they still went on, and Death nodded like a Chinaman to all they said. "

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**Who acts:** chamberlains, Death · **What happens:** go on, nod, say · **To what, where:** all · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Nightingale. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (chamberlains, Death), 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:pg27200:125:126
# text = But they still went on, and Death nodded like a Chinaman to all they said. "
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	still	still	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	on	on	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
8	Death	Death	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
9	nodded	nod	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
10	like	like	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	Chinaman	Chinaman	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
13	to	to	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	9	obl	_	_
15	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
18	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **go on** | past | chamberlains *= chamberlain* |  |  |  | still |  | vn function-105.2.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **nod** | past | Death |  | all |  |  | like a Chinaman | vn wink-40.3.1 «NP V PP.recipient»: agent=Agent to all=Recipient |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | chamberlains *= chamberlain* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: 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:** «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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