---
title: “Of course, I would much rather stay at home, but the miller was so… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: “Of course, I would much rather stay at home, but the miller was so anxious I should be there that I really could not refuse.” Who acts: marriage, miller. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 20, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 20, sentence 84

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“Of course, I would much rather stay at home, but the miller was so anxious I should be there that I really could not refuse.”

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**Who acts:** marriage, miller · **What happens:** stay, be, not refuse · **To what, where:** home · **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 20. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (marriage, miller), 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:pg3282:20:84
# text = “Of course, I would much rather stay at home, but the miller was so anxious I should be there that I really could not refuse.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Of	of	ADP	IN	ExtPos=ADV	9	advmod	_	_
3	course	course	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	fixed	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
5	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
6	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
7	much	much	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
8	rather	rather	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
9	stay	stay	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
10	at	at	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	home	home	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
13	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	miller	miller	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	cop	_	_
17	so	so	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
18	anxious	anxious	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	parataxis	_	_
19	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
20	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
21	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	cop	_	_
22	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	18	ccomp	_	_
23	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
24	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
25	really	really	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
26	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
27	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	28	advmod	_	_
28	refuse	refuse	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **stay** *in a quote* | would | the miller's marriage *= marriage* |  |  | home |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme at home=Location |
| 2 | **is** *in a quote* | past | the miller |  |  |  |  | anxious *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** *in a quote* | should | the miller's marriage *= marriage* |  |  |  |  | there *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **not** **refuse** *in a quote* | could | the miller's marriage *= marriage* |  |  |  |  |  | vn reject-77.2 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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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