---
title: The birds have only two wings, and are obliged to carry them on thei… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: The birds have only two wings, and are obliged to carry them on their backs. Who acts: birds. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Windmill, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Windmill, sentence 7

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The birds have only two wings, and are obliged to carry them on their backs.

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**Who acts:** birds · **What happens:** have, oblige, carry · **To what, where:** two wings, wings, backs

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Windmill. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (birds), 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:pg27200:213:7
# text = The birds have only two wings, and are obliged to carry them on their backs.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	have	have	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	only	only	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	6	nummod	_	_
6	wings	wing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
9	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	aux:pass	_	_
10	obliged	oblige	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	conj	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	carry	carry	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	xcomp	_	_
13	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	obj	_	_
14	on	on	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
16	backs	back	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | present | the birds | two wings |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent wing=Patient |
| 2 | **oblige** | present · passive | the birds *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn compel-59.1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: clause=Result |
| 3 | **carry** | to-infinitive | the birds *not said here* | wings *= wing* |  | wings's backs |  |  | vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |

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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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