---
title: After a time they thought it would be as well to sell the horse, or… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: After a time they thought it would be as well to sell the horse, or exchange it for something which might be more useful to them. Who acts: neighbors, article. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, What the Old Man Does Is Always Right, with its dependency tree an
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, What the Old Man Does Is Always Right, sentence 12

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After a time they thought it would be as well to sell the horse, or exchange it for something which might be more useful to them.

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**Who acts:** neighbors, article · **What happens:** think, be, exchange · **To what, where:** article, neighbors · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (neighbors, article), 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:pg27200:132:12
# text = After a time they thought it would be as well to sell the horse, or exchange it for something which might be more useful to them.
1	After	after	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
4	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
7	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
8	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	cop	_	_
9	as	as	ADV	RB	ExtPos=CCONJ	12	cc	_	_
10	well	well	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	9	fixed	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	sell	sell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	ccomp	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	horse	horse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	exchange	exchange	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	12	parataxis	_	_
18	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	_
19	for	for	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	something	something	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	17	obl	_	_
21	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	25	nsubj	_	_
22	might	might	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	25	aux	_	_
23	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	25	cop	_	_
24	more	more	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	25	advmod	_	_
25	useful	useful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	acl:relcl	_	_
26	to	to	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **think** *speech: other* | past | neighbors *= neighbor* |  |  |  | time |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 2 | **is** | would | article |  |  |  |  | sell *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **exchange** | infinitive |  | article |  |  |  | for something | vn exchange-13.6.1 «NP V NP PP.co-theme»: agent=Agent it=Theme for something=Co-Theme |
| 4 | **is** | might |  |  | neighbors *= neighbor* |  |  | useful *property* | 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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