---
title: He set off then, and the others followed, staring about them cautiou… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: He set off then, and the others followed, staring about them cautiously, and each man keeping a hand on the hilt of his sword. Who acts: grass, others, man. 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 17

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He set off then, and the others followed, staring about them cautiously, and each man keeping a hand on the hilt of his sword.

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**Who acts:** grass, others, man · **What happens:** set off, follow, stare, keep · **To what, where:** hand, hilt

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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 (grass, others, man), 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:pg2892:75:17
# text = He set off then, and the others followed, staring about them cautiously, and each man keeping a hand on the hilt of his sword.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	set	set	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	off	off	ADP	RP	_	2	compound:prt	_	_
4	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	2	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	others	other	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj	_	_
9	followed	follow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
11	staring	stare	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	9	advcl	_	_
12	about	about	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	obl	_	_
14	cautiously	cautiously	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
17	each	each	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	18	det	_	_
18	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	_
19	keeping	keep	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	parataxis	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	hand	hand	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	_
22	on	on	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	hilt	hilt	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
25	of	of	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	27	nmod:poss	_	_
27	sword	sword	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **set off** | past | grass |  |  |  | then |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **follow** | past | the others |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **stare** | gerund | the others *not said here* |  |  |  |  | about others *= other*; cautiously *property* | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent about they=Theme |
| 4 | **keep** | gerund | each man | a hand |  | the hilt of grass's sword |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent hand=Theme on hilt=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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