---
title: The clouds, heavy with hail and snow-flakes, hung low in the sky, an… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: The clouds, heavy with hail and snow-flakes, hung low in the sky, and the raven stood on the ferns crying, "Croak, croak." Who acts: clouds. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Ugly Duckling, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Ugly Duckling, sentence 128

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The clouds, heavy with hail and snow-flakes, hung low in the sky, and the raven stood on the ferns crying, "Croak, croak."

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**Who acts:** clouds · **What happens:** hang, stand, cry · **To what, where:** snow flakes, sky, ferns, Croak

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Ugly Duckling. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (clouds), 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:pg27200:201:128
# text = The clouds, heavy with hail and snow-flakes, hung low in the sky, and the raven stood on the ferns crying, "Croak, croak."
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	clouds	cloud	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	21	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
4	heavy	heavy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	2	amod	_	_
5	with	with	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	hail	hail	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
8	snow	snow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	flakes	flake	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
12	hung	hang	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	acl	_	_
13	low	low	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	xcomp	_	_
14	in	in	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	sky	sky	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	raven	raven	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
21	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
22	on	on	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	ferns	fern	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	21	obl	_	_
25	crying	cry	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	21	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
27	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	28	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	Croak	croak	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	_
30	croak	croak	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	21	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hang** | participle |  | snow flakes *not said here* |  | the sky |  | low *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent in sky=Location |
| 2 | **stand** | past | the clouds |  |  | the ferns |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on fern=Location |
| 3 | **cry** *speech: express* | gerund | the clouds *not said here* | Croak and croak |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent croak=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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