---
title: The clouds piled themselves up like a chain of mountains, hurried on… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: The clouds piled themselves up like a chain of mountains, hurried on through the air, and spread themselves abroad over the whole landscape, as far as the Dryad's eye could reach. Who acts: clouds, eye. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Dryad, part 1, with
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Dryad, part 1, sentence 67

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The clouds piled themselves up like a chain of mountains, hurried on through the air, and spread themselves abroad over the whole landscape, as far as the Dryad's eye could reach.

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**Who acts:** clouds, eye · **What happens:** pile up, hurry on, spread, reach · **To what, where:** clouds, mountains, air, whole landscape

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Dryad, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (clouds, eye), 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:pg27200:24:67
# text = The clouds piled themselves up like a chain of mountains, hurried on through the air, and spread themselves abroad over the whole landscape, as far as the Dryad's eye could reach.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	clouds	cloud	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	piled	pile	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	3	obj	_	_
5	up	up	ADP	RP	_	3	compound:prt	_	_
6	like	like	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	chain	chain	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	mountains	mountain	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
12	hurried	hurry	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	acl	_	_
13	on	on	ADP	RP	_	12	compound:prt	_	_
14	through	through	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	air	air	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	spread	spread	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
20	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	19	obj	_	_
21	abroad	abroad	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
22	over	over	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
24	whole	whole	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	amod	_	_
25	landscape	landscape	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
27	as	as	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
28	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	19	advmod	_	_
29	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	35	mark	_	_
30	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
31	Dryad	Dryad	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	33	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	's	's	PART	POS	_	31	case	_	_
33	eye	eye	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	35	nsubj	_	_
34	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	35	aux	_	_
35	reach	reach	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **pile up** | past | the clouds | clouds *= cloud* |  |  |  | like a chain of mountains | vn spray-9.7-1-1 «NP.theme V NP»: agent=Theme themselves=Destination |
| 2 | **hurry on** | participle |  | mountains *not said here* |  | the air |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through air=Trajectory |
| 3 | **spread** | past | the clouds *not said here* | clouds *= cloud* |  | the whole landscape |  | abroad, far *property* | vn spray-9.7-1 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent themselves=Theme over landscape=Destination |
| 4 | **reach** | could | the Dryad's eye |  |  |  |  |  | vn body\_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=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.

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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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