---
title: She was smiling to herself secretly, for she had seen what the morta… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: She was smiling to herself secretly, for she had seen what the mortal eyes around could not see. Who acts: Becuma, mortal eyes. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter VIII, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter VIII, sentence 41

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She was smiling to herself secretly, for she had seen what the mortal eyes around could not see.

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**Who acts:** Becuma, mortal eyes · **What happens:** smile, see, not see · **To what, where:** Becuma · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter VIII. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Becuma, mortal eyes), 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:pg2892:69:41
# text = She was smiling to herself secretly, for she had seen what the mortal eyes around could not see.
1	She	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	smiling	smile	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	herself	herself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	3	obl	_	_
6	secretly	secretly	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
9	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	seen	see	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	3	conj	_	_
12	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	19	obj	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
14	mortal	mortal	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	nsubj	_	_
16	around	around	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
17	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	19	advmod	_	_
19	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **smile** | past · progressive | Becuma |  | Becuma |  |  | secretly *property* | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V PP.recipient»: agent=Agent to herself=Recipient |
| 2 | **see** | past · perfect | Becuma |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 3 | **not** **see** | could | the mortal eyes |  |  |  |  | around *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer what=Stimulus |

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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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