---
title: A clock, with heavy weights, hung on the wall and went "tick, tick,"… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: A clock, with heavy weights, hung on the wall and went "tick, tick," steadily enough; yet it was always rather too fast, which, however, the old people said was better than being too slow. Who acts: wall. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Old Street Lamp, 
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Old Street Lamp, sentence 88

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
A clock, with heavy weights, hung on the wall and went "tick, tick," steadily enough; yet it was always rather too fast, which, however, the old people said was better than being too slow.

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**Who acts:** wall · **What happens:** hang, go, be, say · **To what, where:** clock, wall, tick · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (wall), 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:pg27200:133:88
# text = A clock, with heavy weights, hung on the wall and went "tick, tick," steadily enough; yet it was always rather too fast, which, however, the old people said was better than being too slow.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	clock	clock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj:pass	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
4	with	with	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	heavy	heavy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	weights	weight	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
8	hung	hang	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
9	on	on	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	wall	wall	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
14	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	tick	tick	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
17	tick	tick	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	20	punct	_	_
20	steadily	steadily	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
21	enough	enough	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	40	punct	_	_
23	yet	yet	CCONJ	CC	_	40	cc	_	_
24	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	29	nsubj	_	_
25	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	29	cop	_	_
26	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	27	advmod	_	_
27	rather	rather	ADV	RB	_	29	advmod	_	_
28	too	too	ADV	RB	_	29	advmod	_	_
29	fast	fast	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	40	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
31	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	38	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
33	however	however	ADV	RB	_	38	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	33	punct	_	_
35	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	37	det	_	_
36	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	37	amod	_	_
37	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	38	nsubj	_	_
38	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	29	parataxis	_	_
39	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	40	cop	_	_
40	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	8	conj	_	_
41	than	than	SCONJ	IN	_	44	mark	_	_
42	being	be	AUX	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	44	cop	_	_
43	too	too	ADV	RB	_	44	advmod	_	_
44	slow	slow	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	40	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
45	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hang** | participle · passive |  | a clock and heavy weights |  | the wall |  | steadily *property* | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: subject=Theme on wall=Destination |
| 2 | **go** | past |  | tick and tick |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **is** | past | wall |  |  |  |  | fast *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  |  |  |  |  | however *property* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **is** | past |  |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 6 | **is** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | slow *property* | tree rules |

<!-- .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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