---
title: Whatever might happen, one thing seemed certain, that he would be se… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: Whatever might happen, one thing seemed certain, that he would be separated from the watchman and his wife, whose family he looked upon as his own. Who acts: Whatever, one thing, wife. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Old Street Lamp, with its dependency 
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Old Street Lamp, sentence 8

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Whatever might happen, one thing seemed certain, that he would be separated from the watchman and his wife, whose family he looked upon as his own.

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**Who acts:** Whatever, one thing, wife · **What happens:** happen, seem, separate, look upon · **To what, where:** thing

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Old Street Lamp. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Whatever, one thing, wife), 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:pg27200:133:8
# text = Whatever might happen, one thing seemed certain, that he would be separated from the watchman and his wife, whose family he looked upon as his own.
1	Whatever	whatever	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	3	nsubj	_	_
2	might	might	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	happen	happen	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
5	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	6	nummod	_	_
6	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	seemed	seem	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
8	certain	certain	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
10	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	14	mark	_	_
11	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
12	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	aux:pass	_	_
14	separated	separate	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	7	conj	_	_
15	from	from	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	watchman	watchman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
19	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
22	whose	whose	PRON	WP$	Poss=Yes|PronType=Rel	23	nmod:poss	_	_
23	family	family	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	conj	_	_
24	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	nsubj	_	_
25	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	conj	_	_
26	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	25	compound:prt	_	_
27	as	as	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	29	nmod:poss	_	_
29	own	own	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **happen** | might | Whatever |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **seem** | past | one thing |  |  |  |  | certain *property* | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **separate** | would · passive |  | thing |  |  |  | from the watchman | vn separate-23.1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.co-patient»: subject=Patient from watchman=Co-Patient |
| 4 | **look upon** | past | thing's wife and thing's wife and wife's family's family |  |  |  |  | as thing's own | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus |

<!-- .note -->
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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