---
title: The hole was dark and deep, and if it had a bottom no one could see… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The hole was dark and deep, and if it had a bottom no one could see it. Who acts: hole, one. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 39, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 39, sentence 118

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The hole was dark and deep, and if it had a bottom no one could see it.

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**Who acts:** hole, one · **What happens:** be, have, see · **To what, where:** bottom

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 39. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hole, one), 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:pg3027:39:118
# text = The hole was dark and deep, and if it had a bottom no one could see it.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	hole	hole	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	dark	dark	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
5	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
6	deep	deep	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
9	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
10	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	bottom	bottom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
14	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	15	det	_	_
15	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nsubj	_	_
16	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
17	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	conj	_	_
18	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the hole |  |  |  |  | dark *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **be** |  | the hole *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **have** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | hole | a bottom |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent bottom=Patient |
| 4 | **see** | could | no one | bottom |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer it=Stimulus |

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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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