---
title: But in truth she had done nothing of the sort, and it was only an ex… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But in truth she had done nothing of the sort, and it was only an excuse to go and seek the buffalo. Who acts: girl, sort. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 21, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3027/21/40/)

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 21, sentence 40

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But in truth she had done nothing of the sort, and it was only an excuse to go and seek the buffalo.

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**Who acts:** girl, sort · **What happens:** do, be, go, seek · **To what, where:** nothing, truth, excuse, buffalo

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 21. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (girl, sort), 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:pg3027:21:40
# text = But in truth she had done nothing of the sort, and it was only an excuse to go and seek the buffalo.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
2	in	in	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
3	truth	truth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
4	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
5	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
6	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
7	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	6	obj	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	sort	sort	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
13	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
14	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	cop	_	_
15	only	only	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
16	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	excuse	excuse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	parataxis	_	_
18	to	to	PART	TO	_	19	mark	_	_
19	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	acl	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	seek	seek	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	conj	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	buffalo	buffalo	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **do** | past · perfect | girl | nothing |  | truth |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent nothing=Eventuality |
| 2 | **is a** | past | sort | a excuse |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **go** | to-infinitive | girl *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **seek** | infinitive | girl *not said here* | the buffalo |  |  |  |  | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent buffalo=Theme |

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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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