---
title: He would lay his head quite round over his tail, and clatter with hi… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: He would lay his head quite round over his tail, and clatter with his beak, as if it had been a rattle; and then he would tell them stories all about the marshes and fens. Who acts: father, clatter. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Storks, with its depend
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Storks, sentence 38

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He would lay his head quite round over his tail, and clatter with his beak, as if it had been a rattle; and then he would tell them stories all about the marshes and fens.

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**Who acts:** father, clatter · **What happens:** lay, be, tell · **To what, where:** head, tail, rattle, stories, heads · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Storks. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (father, clatter), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg27200:183:38
# text = He would lay his head quite round over his tail, and clatter with his beak, as if it had been a rattle; and then he would tell them stories all about the marshes and fens.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	lay	lay	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
4	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	quite	quite	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
7	round	round	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
8	over	over	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	tail	tail	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	clatter	clatter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
14	with	with	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
16	beak	beak	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
18	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	24	mark	_	_
19	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	24	mark	_	_
20	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
21	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
22	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	24	cop	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	rattle	rattle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	30	punct	_	_
26	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	30	cc	_	_
27	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	30	advmod	_	_
28	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	30	nsubj	_	_
29	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	30	aux	_	_
30	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
31	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	30	iobj	_	_
32	stories	story	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	30	obj	_	_
33	all	all	ADV	RB	_	36	advmod	_	_
34	about	about	ADP	IN	_	36	case	_	_
35	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	36	det	_	_
36	marshes	marsh	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	30	obl	_	_
37	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	38	cc	_	_
38	fens	fen	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	36	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
39	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **lay** | would | father | father's head |  | father's tail |  | clatter with father's beak *obl*; round *property* | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent head=Theme over tail=Destination |
| 2 | **is a** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · perfect | clatter | a rattle |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **tell** *speech: assert* | would | father | stories | heads *= head* |  | then | about the marshes and fens | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent they=Recipient story=Topic |

<!-- .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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