---
title: Quick as lightning the prince was on her track, but this time it was… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Quick as lightning the prince was on her track, but this time it was with no wish to kill or even wound the beautiful creature. Who acts: prince, time. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 24, 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/pg3027/24/42/)

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 24, sentence 42

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Quick as lightning the prince was on her track, but this time it was with no wish to kill or even wound the beautiful creature.

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**Who acts:** prince, time · **What happens:** be, kill, wound · **To what, where:** track, beautiful creature

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 24. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (prince, time), 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:pg3027:24:42
# text = Quick as lightning the prince was on her track, but this time it was with no wish to kill or even wound the beautiful creature.
1	Quick	quick	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	case	_	_
2	as	as	ADP	IN	_	1	fixed	_	_
3	lightning	lightning	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	prince	prince	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
6	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
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	track	track	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
11	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
12	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	13	det	_	_
13	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	_
14	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
15	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	cop	_	_
16	with	with	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	18	det	_	_
18	wish	wish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	parataxis	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	kill	kill	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	acl	_	_
21	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
22	even	even	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	_
23	wound	wound	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	20	conj	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
25	beautiful	beautiful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	amod	_	_
26	creature	creature	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the prince |  |  | animal's track |  | quick lightning | tree rules |
| 2 | **is** | past | this time |  |  |  |  | with no wish | tree rules |
| 3 | **kill** | to-infinitive | the prince *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Experiencer |
| 4 | **wound** | infinitive | the prince *not said here* | the beautiful creature |  |  |  |  | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus creature=Experiencer |

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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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