---
title: “Fionn,” said he, “there isn’t a whistle in me. — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “Fionn,” said he, “there isn’t a whistle in me. Who acts: Fionn, whistle. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter IV, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter IV, sentence 16

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“Fionn,” said he, “there isn’t a whistle in me.

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**Who acts:** Fionn, whistle · **What happens:** say, not be · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter IV. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Fionn, whistle), 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:pg2892:59:16
# text = “Fionn,” said he, “there isn’t a whistle in me.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Fionn	Fionn	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
5	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	10	expl	_	_
10	is	be	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	n’t	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	10	advmod	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	whistle	whistle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	_
14	in	in	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Fionn |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **not** **be** *in a quote* | present | a whistle |  |  | there |  | in Fionn | vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in i=Location |

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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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