---
title: It would be hard to tell of the terror that was in Fionn’s breast an… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: It would be hard to tell of the terror that was in Fionn’s breast and in the hearts of the Fianna while they attended the conclusion of that race. Who acts: terror, hearts. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter VI, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter VI, sentence 1

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It would be hard to tell of the terror that was in Fionn’s breast and in the hearts of the Fianna while they attended the conclusion of that race.

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**Who acts:** terror, hearts · **What happens:** be, tell, attend, conclude · **To what, where:** breast, conclusion, race · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter VI. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (terror, hearts), 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:pg2892:53:1
# text = It would be hard to tell of the terror that was in Fionn’s breast and in the hearts of the Fianna while they attended the conclusion of that race.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	expl	_	_
2	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	cop	_	_
4	hard	hard	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	csubj	_	_
7	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	terror	terror	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
10	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	15	nsubj	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	cop	_	_
12	in	in	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
13	Fionn	Fionn	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	15	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	’s	's	PART	POS	_	13	case	_	_
15	breast	breast	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	acl:relcl	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	hearts	heart	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	conj	_	_
20	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	Fianna	Fianna	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	nmod	_	_
23	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	25	mark	_	_
24	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	nsubj	_	_
25	attended	attend	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	advcl	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	conclusion	conclusion	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	_
28	of	of	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	30	det	_	_
30	race	race	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | would |  |  |  |  |  | hard *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  | of the terror | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is** | past | the terror |  |  | Fionn's breast and the hearts of the Fianna |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **attend** | past | hearts *= heart* | the conclusion of that race |  |  |  |  | vn attend-107.4-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme conclusion=Goal |
| 5 | **conclude** |  |  | that race |  |  |  |  | nom conclusion «cognition transitive»: of=patient |

<!-- .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:** «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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- ← previous: [Chapter V, 45](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/52/45/)
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- ↑ back to [Chapter VI](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/53/)