---
title: There were old, lusty women going by, and when these were not talkin… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: There were old, lusty women going by, and when these were not talking together it was because their mouths were mutually filled with apples and meat-pies. Who acts: old lusty women, these. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XIV, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics o
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2892/85/6/)

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter XIV, sentence 6

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There were old, lusty women going by, and when these were not talking together it was because their mouths were mutually filled with apples and meat-pies.

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**Who acts:** old lusty women, these · **What happens:** be, go by, not talk, fill · **To what, where:** concourse

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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 (old lusty women, these), 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:pg2892:85:6
# text = There were old, lusty women going by, and when these were not talking together it was because their mouths were mutually filled with apples and meat-pies.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
5	lusty	lusty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	women	woman	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	nsubj	_	_
7	going	go	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	6	acl	_	_
8	by	by	ADP	IN	_	7	fixed	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
11	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
12	these	this	PRON	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	15	nsubj	_	_
13	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
14	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	15	advmod	_	_
15	talking	talk	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	24	advcl	_	_
16	together	together	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj:pass	_	_
18	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux:pass	_	_
19	because	because	SCONJ	IN	_	24	mark	_	_
20	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	21	nmod:poss	_	_
21	mouths	mouth	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	nsubj:pass	_	_
22	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux:pass	_	_
23	mutually	mutually	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
24	filled	fill	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	2	conj	_	_
25	with	with	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
26	apples	apple	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	obl	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	30	cc	_	_
28	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	30	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	28	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	pies	pie	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	26	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | old lusty women |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **go by** | gerund | old lusty women *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **not** **talk** | past · progressive | these |  |  |  |  | together *property* | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **fill** | past · passive |  | concourse |  |  |  | with apples and meat pies; mutually *property* | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: subject=Patient with apple=Instrument |

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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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