---
title: And again the duckling had to admit that he could do nothing but swi… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: And again the duckling had to admit that he could do nothing but swim, which did not seem of much use to anybody. Who acts: duckling, moor. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 9, 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/pg3027/9/58/)

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 9, sentence 58

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And again the duckling had to admit that he could do nothing but swim, which did not seem of much use to anybody.

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**Who acts:** duckling, moor · **What happens:** have, admit, do, swim, not seem · **To what, where:** nothing · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (duckling, moor), 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:pg3027:9:58
# text = And again the duckling had to admit that he could do nothing but swim, which did not seem of much use to anybody.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	again	again	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	duckling	duckling	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	admit	admit	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	xcomp	_	_
8	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
9	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	ccomp	_	_
12	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	11	obj	_	_
13	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	swim	swim	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	19	nsubj	_	_
17	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	19	advmod	_	_
19	seem	seem	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	conj	_	_
20	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	much	much	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	use	use	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
23	to	to	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	anybody	anybody	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	22	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | the duckling |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **admit** *speech: other* | to-infinitive | the duckling *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn confess-37.10 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **do** | could | moor | nothing |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent nothing=Eventuality |
| 4 | **swim** | present | the duckling *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **not** **seem** | past · do-support |  |  |  |  |  | of much use to anybody | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .note -->
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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