---
title: In an instant the river was covered with bobbing heads all swimming… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: In an instant the river was covered with bobbing heads all swimming their fastest towards the king, who had been carried far down by the swift current. Who acts: swift current. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 37, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of ever
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3027/37/67/)

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 37, sentence 67

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In an instant the river was covered with bobbing heads all swimming their fastest towards the king, who had been carried far down by the swift current.

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**Who acts:** swift current · **What happens:** cover, swim, carry · **To what, where:** river, king

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 37. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (swift current), 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:pg3027:37:67
# text = In an instant the river was covered with bobbing heads all swimming their fastest towards the king, who had been carried far down by the swift current.
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	instant	instant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	river	river	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj:pass	_	_
6	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	aux:pass	_	_
7	covered	cover	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
8	with	with	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	bobbing	bobbing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	compound	_	_
10	heads	head	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obl	_	_
11	all	all	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
12	swimming	swim	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	14	csubj	_	_
13	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	fastest	fast	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	7	parataxis	_	_
15	towards	towards	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
19	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	22	nsubj:pass	_	_
20	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
21	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	22	aux:pass	_	_
22	carried	carry	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	17	acl:relcl	_	_
23	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	24	advmod	_	_
24	down	down	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
25	by	by	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
27	swift	swift	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	28	amod	_	_
28	current	current	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **cover** | past · passive |  | the river |  |  |  | with bobbing heads; in a instant | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: subject=Destination in instant=Theme |
| 2 | **swim** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | all *property* | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **carry** | past · perfect · passive | the swift current | the king |  |  |  | down *property* | vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent subject=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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