---
title: Faint as was her whisper, it reached the ears of Alonzo, who, though… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Faint as was her whisper, it reached the ears of Alonzo, who, though he still could not speak for laughing, shook his head. Who acts: whisper, ears. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 10, 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/pg3282/10/98/)

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 10, sentence 98

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Faint as was her whisper, it reached the ears of Alonzo, who, though he still could not speak for laughing, shook his head.

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**Who acts:** whisper, ears · **What happens:** be, reach, not speak, laugh, shake · **To what, where:** ears, head · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 10. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (whisper, ears), 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:pg3282:10:98
# text = Faint as was her whisper, it reached the ears of Alonzo, who, though he still could not speak for laughing, shook his head.
1	Faint	faint	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	case	_	_
2	as	as	ADP	IN	_	1	fixed	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	whisper	whisper	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
7	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	reached	reach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	ears	ear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	Alonzo	Alonzo	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
14	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	21	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
16	though	though	SCONJ	IN	_	21	mark	_	_
17	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
18	still	still	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	_
19	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
20	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	21	advmod	_	_
21	speak	speak	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	conj	_	_
22	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	23	mark	_	_
23	laughing	laugh	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	21	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
25	shook	shake	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
26	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	27	nmod:poss	_	_
27	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past |  |  |  |  |  | faint girl's whisper | tree rules |
| 2 | **reach** | past | whisper | the ears of Alonzo |  |  |  |  | vn body\_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent ear=Theme |
| 3 | **not** **speak** *speech: other* | could | the ears of Alonzo |  |  |  | still |  | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **laugh** | gerund | the ears of Alonzo *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn nonverbal\_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **shake** | past | whisper *not said here* | Alonzo's head |  |  |  |  | vn shake-22.3-2 «NP V NP together»: agent=Agent head=Patient |

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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 Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3282 (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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