---
title: The little boy still sat astride on its back, when he felt something… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: The little boy still sat astride on its back, when he felt something pulling at his clothes. Who acts: little boy, boy. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Metal Pig, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Metal Pig, sentence 126

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The little boy still sat astride on its back, when he felt something pulling at his clothes.

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**Who acts:** little boy, boy · **What happens:** sit, feel, pull · **To what, where:** back, something

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Metal Pig. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (little boy, boy), 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:pg27200:89:126
# text = The little boy still sat astride on its back, when he felt something pulling at his clothes.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	still	still	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	astride	astride	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
7	on	on	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	back	back	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
11	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	13	advmod	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	felt	feel	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
14	something	something	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	13	obj	_	_
15	pulling	pull	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	14	acl	_	_
16	at	at	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	clothes	clothes	NOUN	NNS	Number=Ptan	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sit** | past | the little boy |  |  | pig's back | still | astride *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on back=Location |
| 2 | **feel** | past | boy | something |  |  |  |  | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent something=Theme |
| 3 | **pull** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | at boy's clothes | vn push-12-1 «NP V PP-Conative»: agent=Agent at clothes=Theme |

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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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