---
title: It had been better for thee if thou hadst been left on the high-road… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: It had been better for thee if thou hadst been left on the high-road, with the cold night wind to lull thee to sleep." Who acts: form. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Marsh King's Daughter, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every cla
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Marsh King's Daughter, part 3, sentence 81

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
It had been better for thee if thou hadst been left on the high-road, with the cold night wind to lull thee to sleep."

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**Who acts:** form · **What happens:** be, leave, lull, sleep · **To what, where:** thou, high road, thee

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Marsh King's Daughter, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (form), 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:pg27200:85:81
# text = It had been better for thee if thou hadst been left on the high-road, with the cold night wind to lull thee to sleep."
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	4	cop	_	_
4	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	0	root	_	_
5	for	for	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	thee	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	4	obl	_	_
7	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
8	thou	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	11	nsubj:pass	_	_
9	hadst	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Style=Arch|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	aux:pass	_	_
10	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	11	aux:pass	_	_
11	left	leave	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	advcl	_	_
12	on	on	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
14	high	high	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	road	road	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
18	with	with	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
20	cold	cold	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
21	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	compound	_	_
22	wind	wind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
23	to	to	PART	TO	_	24	mark	_	_
24	lull	lull	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	acl	_	_
25	thee	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	24	obj	_	_
26	to	to	PART	TO	_	27	mark	_	_
27	sleep	sleep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	24	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past · perfect | form |  |  |  |  | for thee; good *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **leave** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · passive |  | thou |  | the high road |  | with the cold night wind | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP PP.location»: subject=Theme on road=Location |
| 3 | **lull** | to-infinitive |  | thee |  |  |  |  | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus thou=Experiencer |
| 4 | **sleep** | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn snooze-40.4-1 «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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