---
title: "Yes," replied the old lady, "they must also die, and their term of… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: "Yes," replied the old lady, "they must also die, and their term of life is even shorter than ours. Who acts: old lady, beings, term. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Little Mermaid, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Little Mermaid, part 2, sentence 53

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"Yes," replied the old lady, "they must also die, and their term of life is even shorter than ours.

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**Who acts:** old lady, beings, term · **What happens:** reply, die, be, term · **To what, where:** old lady, life · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Little Mermaid, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (old lady, beings, term), 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:pg27200:76:53
# text = "Yes," replied the old lady, "they must also die, and their term of life is even shorter than ours.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Yes	yes	INTJ	UH	Polarity=Pos	5	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
5	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	lady	lady	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
10	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
12	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	also	also	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
14	die	die	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
17	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	term	term	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nsubj	_	_
19	of	of	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nmod	_	_
21	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	cop	_	_
22	even	even	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	_
23	shorter	short	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	5	parataxis	_	_
24	than	than	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	ours	our	PRON	PRP	Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | the old lady |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V S-Quote»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **die** *in a quote* | must | beings *= being* | the old lady *not said here* |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** *in a quote* | present | beings's term of life |  |  |  |  | than ours; short *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **term** *in a quote* |  | beings *= being* | life |  |  |  |  | nom term «communication transitive»: poss=agent of=patient |

<!-- .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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