---
title: To her surprise, three little doves were sitting on the handle, all… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: To her surprise, three little doves were sitting on the handle, all of them looking very sad. Who acts: three little doves, all, mother. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 12, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 12, sentence 30

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To her surprise, three little doves were sitting on the handle, all of them looking very sad.

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**Who acts:** three little doves, all, mother · **What happens:** sit, look, surprise · **To what, where:** handle

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 12. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (three little doves, all, mother), 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:pg3027:12:30
# text = To her surprise, three little doves were sitting on the handle, all of them looking very sad.
1	To	to	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	surprise	surprise	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
5	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	7	nummod	_	_
6	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	doves	dove	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj	_	_
8	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	sitting	sit	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
10	on	on	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	handle	handle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
14	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	17	nsubj	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nmod	_	_
17	looking	look	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	9	conj	_	_
18	very	very	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
19	sad	sad	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sit** | past · progressive | three little doves |  |  | the handle |  | to mother's surprise | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on handle=Location |
| 2 | **look** | gerund | all |  |  |  |  | sad *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus |
| 3 | **surprise** |  | mother |  |  |  |  |  | nom surprise «feeling transitive»: poss=agent |

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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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