---
title: “Had you not observed it before?” his master asked with kindly malice. — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “Had you not observed it before?” his master asked with kindly malice. Who acts: you, master. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter I, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/40/21/)

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter I, sentence 21

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“Had you not observed it before?” his master asked with kindly malice.

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**Who acts:** you, master · **What happens:** have, not observe, ask · **To what, where:** truth · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter I. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, master), 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:pg2892:40:21
# text = “Had you not observed it before?” his master asked with kindly malice.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	observed	observe	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	ccomp	_	_
6	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	obj	_	_
7	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
10	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
12	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
13	with	with	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	kindly	kindly	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	malice	malice	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** *in a quote* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **not** **observe** *in a quote* | past | you | truth |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent it=Topic |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | Crimthann's master |  |  |  |  | with malice | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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:** «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Project Gutenberg book 2892 (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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