---
title: The little bird was quite taken aback, for he meant it kindly. — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: The little bird was quite taken aback, for he meant it kindly. Who acts: bird. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Portuguese Duck, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Portuguese Duck, sentence 87

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The little bird was quite taken aback, for he meant it kindly.

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**Who acts:** bird · **What happens:** take, mean · **To what, where:** little bird, head

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Portuguese Duck. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (bird), 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:pg27200:145:87
# text = The little bird was quite taken aback, for he meant it kindly.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj:pass	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux:pass	_	_
5	quite	quite	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	taken	take	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
7	aback	aback	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	meant	mean	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
12	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	obj	_	_
13	kindly	kindly	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take** | past · passive |  | the little bird |  |  |  | aback *property* | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP ADVP»: subject=Destination |
| 2 | **mean** | past | bird | head |  |  |  | kindly *property* | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Topic |

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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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