---
title: He looked a personification of fasting; but he carried his nose very… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: He looked a personification of fasting; but he carried his nose very high, for he was related to the "forty (k)nights," and was a weather prophet. Who acts: man, personification. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Mail-coach Passengers, with its dependency 
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Mail-coach Passengers, sentence 34

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He looked a personification of fasting; but he carried his nose very high, for he was related to the "forty (k)nights," and was a weather prophet.

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**Who acts:** man, personification · **What happens:** look, fast, carry, be · **To what, where:** personification, nose, weather prophet

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Mail-coach Passengers. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, personification), 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:pg27200:82:34
# text = He looked a personification of fasting; but he carried his nose very high, for he was related to the "forty (k)nights," and was a weather prophet.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	personification	personification	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
5	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
6	fasting	fast	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	4	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	10	punct	_	_
8	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
9	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
10	carried	carry	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
11	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	nose	nose	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
13	very	very	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
14	high	high	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	for	for	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
17	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
18	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	cop	_	_
19	related	related	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	ccomp	_	_
20	to	to	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
22	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	23	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	forty	forty	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	27	nummod	_	_
24	(	(	PUNCT	-LRB-	_	25	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	k	k	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	)	)	PUNCT	-RRB-	_	25	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	nights	night	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	19	punct	_	_
30	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	34	cc	_	_
31	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	34	cop	_	_
32	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	34	det	_	_
33	weather	weather	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	34	compound	_	_
34	prophet	prophet	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **look** | past | man | a personification |  |  |  |  | vn seem-109-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme personification=Attribute |
| 2 | **fast** | gerund | a personification *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **carry** | past | man | man's nose |  |  |  |  | vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent nose=Theme |
| 4 | **is** | past | man |  |  |  | night | related *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **is a** | past | man *not said here* | a weather prophet |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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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