---
title: "Yes, but it is very little," said mamma stork; "they could not poss… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: "Yes, but it is very little," said mamma stork; "they could not possibly have done less." Who acts: feast, mamma stork, balustrades. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Marsh King's Daughter, part 6, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every claus
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/88/64/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/) / [The Marsh King's Daughter, part 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/88/) / 64

# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Marsh King's Daughter, part 6, sentence 64

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
"Yes, but it is very little," said mamma stork; "they could not possibly have done less."

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** feast, mamma stork, balustrades · **What happens:** be, say, not do · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Marsh King's Daughter, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (feast, mamma stork, balustrades), 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:pg27200:88:64
# text = "Yes, but it is very little," said mamma stork; "they could not possibly have done less."
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Yes	yes	INTJ	UH	Polarity=Pos	11	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
4	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
5	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
6	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	cop	_	_
7	very	very	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
8	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	2	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
11	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	mamma	mamma	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	_
13	stork	stork	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
15	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
17	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
18	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	21	advmod	_	_
19	possibly	possibly	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	_
20	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	aux	_	_
21	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	11	conj	_	_
22	less	less	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	21	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** *in a quote* | present | feast |  |  |  |  | little *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | mamma stork |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **not** **do** *in a quote* | could · perfect | balustrades *= balustrade* |  |  |  |  | less, possibly *property* | vn act-114-1 «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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 63](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/88/63/)
- next →: [sentence 65](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/88/65/)
- ↑ back to [The Marsh King's Daughter, part 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/88/)