---
title: A few flakes of snow were falling, and one of them, rather larger th… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: A few flakes of snow were falling, and one of them, rather larger than the rest, alighted on the edge of one of the flower boxes. Who acts: few flakes. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, A Little Boy and a Little Girl, with its dependency tree and the pragmatic
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, A Little Boy and a Little Girl, sentence 25

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A few flakes of snow were falling, and one of them, rather larger than the rest, alighted on the edge of one of the flower boxes.

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**Who acts:** few flakes · **What happens:** fall, alight · **To what, where:** rest, edge

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, A Little Boy and a Little Girl. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (few flakes), 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:pg27200:171:25
# text = A few flakes of snow were falling, and one of them, rather larger than the rest, alighted on the edge of one of the flower boxes.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	few	few	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	flakes	flake	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	nsubj	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	snow	snow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nmod	_	_
6	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	aux	_	_
7	falling	fall	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
10	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	15	nsubj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	rather	rather	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	larger	large	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	7	conj	_	_
16	than	than	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	rest	rest	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
20	alighted	alight	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	18	acl	_	_
21	on	on	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	edge	edge	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	23	nmod	_	_
26	of	of	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
27	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
28	flower	flower	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	compound	_	_
29	boxes	box	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fall** | past · progressive | a few flakes of snow |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **alight** | participle |  | the rest *not said here* |  | the edge of one of the flower boxes |  |  | 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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