---
title: So Mongan did ask him, and it was in a melancholy voice that he aske… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: So Mongan did ask him, and it was in a melancholy voice that he asked it. Who acts: Mongan, word. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XI, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter XI, sentence 32

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So Mongan did ask him, and it was in a melancholy voice that he asked it.

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**Who acts:** Mongan, word · **What happens:** ask, be · **To what, where:** Leinster, melancholy voice, word

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XI. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Mongan, word), 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:pg2892:82:32
# text = So Mongan did ask him, and it was in a melancholy voice that he asked it.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
2	Mongan	Mongan	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	ask	ask	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
8	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
9	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	cop	_	_
10	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
11	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	melancholy	melancholy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	_
13	voice	voice	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	parataxis	_	_
14	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	16	obj	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	acl:relcl	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past · do-support | Mongan |  | Leinster |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent he=Recipient |
| 2 | **is** | past | word |  |  | a melancholy voice |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | Mongan | a melancholy voice | word |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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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