---
title: But after a while the rain began to fall gently, the sun's rays pier… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: But after a while the rain began to fall gently, the sun's rays pierced the clouds, and the water-drops glittered like pearls on leaf and stem. Who acts: rain, rays, sun. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Story of the Year, with its dependency tree and the
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/214/102/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/) / [The Story of the Year](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/214/) / 102

# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Story of the Year, sentence 102

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But after a while the rain began to fall gently, the sun's rays pierced the clouds, and the water-drops glittered like pearls on leaf and stem.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** rain, rays, sun · **What happens:** begin, fall, pierce, glitter, ray · **To what, where:** clouds, water drops, leaf

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Story of the Year. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (rain, rays, sun), 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:pg27200:214:102
# text = But after a while the rain began to fall gently, the sun's rays pierced the clouds, and the water-drops glittered like pearls on leaf and stem.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
2	after	after	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	while	while	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	rain	rain	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
9	fall	fall	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	xcomp	_	_
10	gently	gently	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	sun	sun	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	's	's	PART	POS	_	13	case	_	_
15	rays	ray	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj	_	_
16	pierced	pierce	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	clouds	cloud	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
22	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	22	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	drops	drop	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nsubj:pass	_	_
25	glittered	glitter	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	7	conj	_	_
26	like	like	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	pearls	pearl	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	obl	_	_
28	on	on	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
29	leaf	leaf	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	_
30	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	31	cc	_	_
31	stem	stem	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **begin** | past | the rain |  |  |  | while |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **fall** | to-infinitive | the rain *not said here* |  |  |  |  | gently *property* | vn occur-48.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **pierce** | past | the sun's rays | the clouds |  |  |  |  | vn poke-19-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent cloud=Patient |
| 4 | **glitter** | participle · passive |  | the water drops |  | leaf and stem |  | like pearls | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: subject=Theme |
| 5 | **ray** |  | the sun |  |  |  |  |  | nom ray «phenomenon transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 101](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/214/101/)
- next →: [sentence 103](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/214/103/)
- ↑ back to [The Story of the Year](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/214/)