---
title: Many gate-keepers were on guard, and there was no chance of passing… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Many gate-keepers were on guard, and there was no chance of passing them. Who acts: Many gate keepers, chance. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 2, sentence 31

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Many gate-keepers were on guard, and there was no chance of passing them.

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**Who acts:** Many gate keepers, chance · **What happens:** be, pass · **To what, where:** guard, chance, keepers

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Many gate keepers, chance), 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:pg3282:2:31
# text = Many gate-keepers were on guard, and there was no chance of passing them.
1	Many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
2	gate	gate	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	keepers	keeper	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
5	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
6	on	on	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	guard	guard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
10	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	11	expl	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	cop	_	_
12	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	13	det	_	_
13	chance	chance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
14	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
15	passing	pass	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	13	acl	_	_
16	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	13	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | Many gate keepers and guard *not said here* |  |  | guard |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **is a** | past | Many gate keepers and guard | no chance |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **pass** | gerund | no chance *not said here* | keepers *= keeper* |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1-3 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme they=Trajectory |

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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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