---
title: The poor horses looked wretched; the flies settled on their backs in… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: The poor horses looked wretched; the flies settled on their backs in swarms, and they were only relieved when the coachmen got down and drove the creatures off. Who acts: poor horses, flies, coachmen. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Best Thing the Golosh
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Best Thing the Goloshes Did, sentence 29

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The poor horses looked wretched; the flies settled on their backs in swarms, and they were only relieved when the coachmen got down and drove the creatures off.

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**Who acts:** poor horses, flies, coachmen · **What happens:** look, settle, be, get down, drive off · **To what, where:** creatures

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Best Thing the Goloshes Did. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (poor horses, flies, coachmen), 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:pg27200:45:29
# text = The poor horses looked wretched; the flies settled on their backs in swarms, and they were only relieved when the coachmen got down and drove the creatures off.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	horses	horse	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nsubj	_	_
4	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	wretched	wretched	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	9	punct	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	flies	fly	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj	_	_
9	settled	settle	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
10	on	on	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	backs	back	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obl	_	_
13	in	in	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	swarms	swarm	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
17	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
18	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	cop	_	_
19	only	only	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
20	relieved	relieved	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	conj	_	_
21	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	24	advmod	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	coachmen	coachman	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	nsubj	_	_
24	got	get	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	advcl	_	_
25	down	down	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
26	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
27	drove	drive	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	conj	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	creatures	creature	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	27	obj	_	_
30	off	off	ADP	RP	_	27	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **look** | past | the poor horses |  |  |  |  | wretched *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus |
| 2 | **settle** | past | the flies |  |  |  |  | on flies's backs in swarms | vn correspond-36.1 «NP V PP.theme S»: agent=Agent on back=Topic |
| 3 | **is** | past | flies *= fly* |  |  |  |  | relieved *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **get down** | past | the coachmen |  |  |  |  | down *property* | vn convert-26.6.2 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Patient |
| 5 | **drive off** | past | the flies *not said here* | the creatures |  |  |  |  | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme creature=Trajectory |

<!-- .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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