---
title: When they had finished they flew on her shoulders and flapped their… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When they had finished they flew on her shoulders and flapped their wings by way of thanks. Who acts: girls. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 10, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 10, sentence 74

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When they had finished they flew on her shoulders and flapped their wings by way of thanks.

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**Who acts:** girls · **What happens:** finish, fly, flap · **To what, where:** shoulders, wings

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 10. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (girls), 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:pg3027:10:74
# text = When they had finished they flew on her shoulders and flapped their wings by way of thanks.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	4	advmod	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	finished	finish	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	6	advcl	_	_
5	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	flew	fly	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	on	on	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	shoulders	shoulder	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obl	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
11	flapped	flap	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
12	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	wings	wing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	obj	_	_
14	by	by	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	thanks	thanks	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **finish** | past · perfect | girls *= girl* |  |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 2 | **fly** | past | girls *= girl* |  |  | cow's shoulders |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on shoulder=Location |
| 3 | **flap** | past | girls *= girl* *not said here* | girls's wings |  |  |  | by way of thanks | vn crane-40.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent wing=Patient |

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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:** «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3027 (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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