---
title: “I shall be delighted,” answered the fox, “only I would rather that… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: “I shall be delighted,” answered the fox, “only I would rather that you began.” Who acts: fox. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, part 2, sentence 75

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
“I shall be delighted,” answered the fox, “only I would rather that you began.”

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**Who acts:** fox · **What happens:** be, answer, begin · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, 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 (fox), 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:pg3282:35:75
# text = “I shall be delighted,” answered the fox, “only I would rather that you began.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	cop	_	_
5	delighted	delighted	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
8	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	fox	fox	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
12	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	only	only	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	nsubj	_	_
16	rather	rather	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
17	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	19	mark	_	_
18	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** *in a quote* | shall | the fox *= fox* |  |  |  |  | delighted *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past | the fox |  |  |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **begin** *in a quote* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |

<!-- .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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