---
title: It took him a long time, for there were a great many of them, but at… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: It took him a long time, for there were a great many of them, but at last he had them all in his hand. Who acts: It, great many, rock. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 16, 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/pg3282/16/94/)

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 16, sentence 94

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It took him a long time, for there were a great many of them, but at last he had them all in his hand.

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**Who acts:** It, great many, rock · **What happens:** take, be, have · **To what, where:** rock, pieces, last

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 16. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (It, great many, rock), 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:pg3282:16:94
# text = It took him a long time, for there were a great many of them, but at last he had them all in his hand.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	obj	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	10	mark	_	_
9	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	10	expl	_	_
10	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
11	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	nsubj	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
17	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
18	at	at	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	last	last	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	_
20	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
21	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
22	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obj	_	_
23	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	22	nmod:unmarked	_	_
24	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	hand	hand	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take** | past | It |  | rock |  | time |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP ADVP»: agent=Instrument he=Destination |
| 2 | **be** | past | a great many of pieces |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **have** | past | rock | pieces *= piece* |  | last |  | in rock's hand | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Patient |

<!-- .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 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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