---
title: "Kill me," said the poor bird; and he bent his head down to the surf… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: "Kill me," said the poor bird; and he bent his head down to the surface of the water, and awaited death. Who acts: poor bird, better. 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 163

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"Kill me," said the poor bird; and he bent his head down to the surface of the water, and awaited death.

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**Who acts:** poor bird, better · **What happens:** kill, say, bend down, await · **To what, where:** poor bird, head · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (poor bird, better), 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:pg27200:201:163
# text = "Kill me," said the poor bird; and he bent his head down to the surface of the water, and awaited death.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Kill	kill	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	ccomp	_	_
3	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
6	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	13	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	bent	bend	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
14	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	_
16	down	down	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	_
17	to	to	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	surface	surface	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	_
20	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
25	awaited	await	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	26	amod	_	_
26	death	death	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **kill** *in a quote* | infinitive |  | the poor bird *= bird* |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the poor bird |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **bend down** | past | better *= good* | better's head |  |  |  | to the surface of the water *result*; awaited death *obl*; down *property* | vn bend-45.2 «NP V NP PP.result»: agent=Agent head=Patient to surface=Result |
| 4 | **await** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | 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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