---
title: They have flown off their stalks into the air, and flap their leaves… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: They have flown off their stalks into the air, and flap their leaves as if they were little wings to make them fly. Who acts: butterflies. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Little Ida's Flowers, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, Little Ida's Flowers, sentence 39

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They have flown off their stalks into the air, and flap their leaves as if they were little wings to make them fly.

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**Who acts:** butterflies · **What happens:** fly off, flap, be, make, fly · **To what, where:** butterflies, air, leaves

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Little Ida's Flowers. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (butterflies), 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:pg27200:73:39
# text = They have flown off their stalks into the air, and flap their leaves as if they were little wings to make them fly.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	flown	fly	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	off	off	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	stalks	stalk	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	_
7	into	into	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	air	air	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	flap	flap	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
13	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	leaves	leaf	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obj	_	_
15	as	as	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
16	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	20	mark	_	_
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	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	wings	wing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obl	_	_
21	to	to	PART	TO	_	22	mark	_	_
22	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	advcl	_	_
23	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	obj	_	_
24	fly	fly	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fly off** | present · perfect · passive |  | butterflies *= butterfly* |  | the air |  | off butterflies's stalks | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP ADVP»: subject=Theme stalk=Destination |
| 2 | **flap** | infinitive |  | butterflies's leaves |  |  |  |  | vn crane-40.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent leaf=Patient |
| 3 | **is** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | butterflies *= butterfly* |  |  |  |  | as little wings | tree rules |
| 4 | **make** | to-infinitive |  | butterflies *= butterfly* |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **fly** | infinitive | butterflies *= butterfly* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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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