---
title: But before he had time to close his eyes there was a great noise in… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But before he had time to close his eyes there was a great noise in the trees near by, as if a big heavy body was crashing through them. Who acts: lion, great noise, big heavy body. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 18, with its dependency tree and the p
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/18/9/)

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 18, sentence 9

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But before he had time to close his eyes there was a great noise in the trees near by, as if a big heavy body was crashing through them.

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**Who acts:** lion, great noise, big heavy body · **What happens:** have, close, be, crash · **To what, where:** eyes

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 18. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lion, great noise, big heavy body), 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:pg3282:18:9
# text = But before he had time to close his eyes there was a great noise in the trees near by, as if a big heavy body was crashing through them.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
2	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
3	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
5	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	close	close	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	acl	_	_
8	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obj	_	_
10	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	11	expl	_	_
11	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	noise	noise	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	trees	tree	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	nmod	_	_
18	near	near	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
19	by	by	ADP	IN	_	18	fixed	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
21	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
22	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
24	big	big	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	amod	_	_
25	heavy	heavy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	amod	_	_
26	body	body	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	nsubj	_	_
27	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
28	crashing	crash	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	_
29	through	through	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | lion |  |  |  | time |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **close** | to-infinitive | lion *not said here* | lion's eyes |  |  |  |  | vn crane-40.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent eye=Patient |
| 3 | **be** | past | a great noise in the trees |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **crash** | past · progressive | a big heavy body |  |  |  |  | through trees *= tree* | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through they=Location |

<!-- .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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