---
title: He tossed his head with delight at the sight of her, and approached… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He tossed his head with delight at the sight of her, and approached slowly to the place where she stood, a little in front of the mirror. Who acts: dragon, horse. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragm
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3282/37/101/)

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# The Brown Fairy Book, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, part 4, sentence 101

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He tossed his head with delight at the sight of her, and approached slowly to the place where she stood, a little in front of the mirror.

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**Who acts:** dragon, horse · **What happens:** toss, approach, stand, sight · **To what, where:** head, place, little, front, horse

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (dragon, horse), 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:pg3282:37:101
# text = He tossed his head with delight at the sight of her, and approached slowly to the place where she stood, a little in front of the mirror.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	tossed	toss	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	4	nmod:poss	_	_
4	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
5	with	with	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	delight	delight	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
7	at	at	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	sight	sight	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nmod	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	approached	approach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
15	slowly	slowly	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
16	to	to	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	place	place	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
19	where	where	ADV	WRB	PronType=Rel	21	advmod	_	_
20	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
21	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	obl:unmarked	_	_
25	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
26	front	front	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	_
27	of	of	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	mirror	mirror	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **toss** | past | dragon | dragon's head |  |  |  | with delight at the sight of horse | vn preparing-26.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent head=Product with delight=Material |
| 2 | **approach** | past | dragon *not said here* |  |  | the place |  | slowly *property* | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to place=Initial\_Location |
| 3 | **stand** | past | horse | a little |  | front of the mirror |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent in front=Location |
| 4 | **sight** |  |  | horse |  |  |  |  | nom sight «cognition transitive»: of=patient |

<!-- .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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