---
title: “Well, what was it that knocked a howl out of you like the yelp of a… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “Well, what was it that knocked a howl out of you like the yelp of a sick dog, honest man?” Who acts: Da’v, you, sick dog. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XIV, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/85/47/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Irish Fairy Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/) / [Chapter XIV](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/85/) / 47

# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter XIV, sentence 47

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
“Well, what was it that knocked a howl out of you like the yelp of a sick dog, honest man?”

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Da’v, you, sick dog · **What happens:** be, knock, like, yelp · **To what, where:** Da’v, howl, yelp

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XIV. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Da’v, you, sick dog), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg2892:85:47
# text = “Well, what was it that knocked a howl out of you like the yelp of a sick dog, honest man?”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Well	well	INTJ	UH	_	6	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
4	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	6	nsubj	_	_
5	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
6	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
7	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	8	nsubj	_	_
8	knocked	knock	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	howl	howl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
11	out	out	ADP	IN	_	14	mark	_	_
12	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	fixed	_	_
13	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
14	like	like	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	advcl	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	yelp	yelp	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	_
17	of	of	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	sick	sick	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	dog	dog	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
22	honest	honest	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	amod	_	_
23	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | past |  | Da’v *= da'v* |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **knock** *in a quote* | past | Da’v *= da'v* | a howl |  |  |  |  | vn split-23.2 «NP V NP apart»: agent=Agent howl=Patient |
| 3 | **like** *in a quote* | present | you | the yelp of a sick dog and honest man |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot yelp=Theme |
| 4 | **yelp** *in a quote* |  | a sick dog and honest man |  |  |  |  |  | nom yelp «event intransitive»: of=agent |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 46](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/85/46/)
- next →: [sentence 48](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/85/48/)
- ↑ back to [Chapter XIV](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/85/)