---
title: He crouched eagerly down at the edge of the road and said to himself… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He crouched eagerly down at the edge of the road and said to himself: “I wonder what would happen if I were to pretend to be dead! Who acts: Contes. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 26, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/26/49/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Brown Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/) / [The Brown Fairy Book, part 26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/26/) / 49

# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 26, sentence 49

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He crouched eagerly down at the edge of the road and said to himself: “I wonder what would happen if I were to pretend to be dead!

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Contes · **What happens:** crouch, say, wonder, happen, pretend, be · **To what, where:** edge, Contes · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 26. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Contes), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg3282:26:49
# text = He crouched eagerly down at the edge of the road and said to himself: “I wonder what would happen if I were to pretend to be dead!
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	crouched	crouch	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	eagerly	eagerly	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	down	down	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
5	at	at	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	edge	edge	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	road	road	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
13	to	to	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	18	punct	_	_
16	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	wonder	wonder	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	ccomp	_	_
19	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	21	nsubj	_	_
20	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	happen	happen	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	ccomp	_	_
22	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	26	mark	_	_
23	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
24	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	aux	_	_
25	to	to	PART	TO	_	26	mark	_	_
26	pretend	pretend	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	advcl	_	_
27	to	to	PART	TO	_	29	mark	_	_
28	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	29	cop	_	_
29	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **crouch** | past | Contes |  |  | the edge of the road |  | down *property* | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme at edge=Location |
| 2 | **say** *speech: express* | past | Contes *not said here* |  | Contes |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to himself=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **wonder** *speech: ask* *in a quote* | present | Contes |  |  |  |  |  | vn care-88.1-1 «NP V what S»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 4 | **happen** *in a quote* | would |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **pretend** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | past | Contes |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 6 | **is** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | Contes *not said here* |  |  |  |  | dead *property* | tree rules |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 48](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/26/48/)
- next →: [sentence 50](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/26/50/)
- ↑ back to [The Brown Fairy Book, part 26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/26/)