---
title: So the fox stood up, and did his steps with the best of them; but af… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: So the fox stood up, and did his steps with the best of them; but after a while he stopped and said: Who acts: fox, best, giant. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 23, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 23, sentence 51

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So the fox stood up, and did his steps with the best of them; but after a while he stopped and said:

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**Who acts:** fox, best, giant · **What happens:** stand up, do, step, stop, say · **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 23. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (fox, best, giant), 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:pg3282:23:51
# text = So the fox stood up, and did his steps with the best of them; but after a while he stopped and said:
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	fox	fox	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	up	up	ADP	RP	_	4	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	did	do	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
9	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	steps	step	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
11	with	with	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	best	good	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	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	,	_	22	punct	_	_
17	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	22	cc	_	_
18	after	after	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	while	while	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	_
21	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
22	stopped	stop	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
24	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	22	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **stand up** | past | the fox |  |  |  |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **do** | past | the fox *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **step** |  | the best of grains |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **stop** | past | giant |  |  |  | while |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 5 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | giant *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: 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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