--- title: Small as their possessions were, they had one article they could not… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics description: Small as their possessions were, they had one article they could not do without, and that was a horse, which contrived to live upon the grass which it found by the side of the high road. Who acts: possessions, that, horse, article. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Ande --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/132/10/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/) / [What the Old Man Does Is Always Right](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/132/) / 10 # Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, What the Old Man Does Is Always Right, sentence 10 Small as their possessions were, they had one article they could not do without, and that was a horse, which contrived to live upon the grass which it found by the side of the high road. **Who acts:** possessions, that, horse, article, couple · **What happens:** be, have, not do, contrive, live, find · **To what, where:** one article, horse, grass This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, What the Old Man Does Is Always Right. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (possessions, that, horse, article), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. **Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg27200:8227`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = book:pg27200:132:10 # text = Small as their possessions were, they had one article they could not do without, and that was a horse, which contrived to live upon the grass which it found by the side of the high road. 1 Small small ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 8 advcl _ _ 2 as as SCONJ IN _ 1 mark _ _ 3 their their PRON PRP$ Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs 4 nmod:poss _ _ 4 possessions possession NOUN NNS Number=Plur 1 nsubj _ _ 5 were be AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 1 cop _ _ 6 , , PUNCT , _ 1 punct _ _ 7 they they PRON PRP Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs 8 nsubj _ _ 8 had have VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 9 one one NUM CD NumForm=Word|NumType=Card 10 nummod _ _ 10 article article NOUN NN Number=Sing 8 obj _ _ 11 they they PRON PRP Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs 14 nsubj _ _ 12 could could AUX MD VerbForm=Fin 14 aux _ _ 13 not not PART RB Polarity=Neg 14 advmod _ _ 14 do do VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 10 acl:relcl _ _ 15 without without ADP IN _ 14 obl _ _ 16 , , PUNCT , _ 21 punct _ _ 17 and and CCONJ CC _ 21 cc _ _ 18 that that PRON DT Number=Sing|PronType=Dem 21 nsubj _ _ 19 was be AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 21 cop _ _ 20 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 21 det _ _ 21 horse horse NOUN NN Number=Sing 8 conj _ _ 22 , , PUNCT , _ 24 punct _ _ 23 which which PRON WDT PronType=Rel 24 nsubj _ _ 24 contrived contrive VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 21 acl:relcl _ _ 25 to to PART TO _ 26 mark _ _ 26 live live VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 24 xcomp _ _ 27 upon upon ADP IN _ 29 case _ _ 28 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 29 det _ _ 29 grass grass NOUN NN Number=Sing 26 obl _ _ 30 which which PRON WDT PronType=Rel 32 obj _ _ 31 it it PRON PRP Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 32 nsubj _ _ 32 found find VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 29 acl:relcl _ _ 33 by by ADP IN _ 35 case _ _ 34 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 35 det _ _ 35 side side NOUN NN Number=Sing 32 obl _ _ 36 of of ADP IN _ 39 case _ _ 37 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 39 det _ _ 38 high high ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 39 amod _ _ 39 road road NOUN NN Number=Sing 35 nmod _ _ 40 . . PUNCT . _ 8 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **is** | past | couple's possessions | | | | | small *property* | tree rules | | 2 | **have** | past | possessions *= possession* | one article | | | | | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent article=Patient | | 3 | **not** **do** | could | possessions *= possession* | one article *not said here* | | | | | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent article=Eventuality | | 4 | **is a** | past | that | a horse | | | | | tree rules | | 5 | **contrive** | past | a horse | | | | | | tree rules | | 6 | **live** | to-infinitive | a horse *not said here* | | | the grass | | | vn exist-47.1-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme upon grass=Location | | 7 | **find** | past | article | the grass | | | | by the side of the high road | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent which=Topic | | 8 | **possess** | | couple | | | | | | nom possession «act transitive»: poss=agent | 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. **Text:** «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order. - ← previous: [sentence 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/132/9/) - next →: [sentence 11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/132/11/) - ↑ back to [What the Old Man Does Is Always Right](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/132/)