---
title: “It is true,” Becfola replied, and she became suddenly to the king’s… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “It is true,” Becfola replied, and she became suddenly to the king’s eye a whiteness and a stare. Who acts: chair, Becfola. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter V, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter V, sentence 54

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“It is true,” Becfola replied, and she became suddenly to the king’s eye a whiteness and a stare.

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**Who acts:** chair, Becfola · **What happens:** be, reply, become · **To what, where:** whiteness · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter V. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (chair, Becfola), 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:pg2892:44:54
# text = “It is true,” Becfola replied, and she became suddenly to the king’s eye a whiteness and a stare.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	true	true	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
7	Becfola	Becfola	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
8	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
11	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	became	become	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
13	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
14	to	to	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	’s	's	PART	POS	_	16	case	_	_
18	eye	eye	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
19	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	whiteness	whiteness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	xcomp	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
22	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	stare	stare	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** *in a quote* | present | chair |  |  |  |  | true *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | Becfola |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V S-Quote»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **become** | past | Becfola | a whiteness and a stare |  |  |  | to the king's eye; suddenly *property* | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |

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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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