---
title: But, industrious as he was, he could hardly buy bread and cheese for… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But, industrious as he was, he could hardly buy bread and cheese for himself and his wife, and they grew thinner and thinner daily. Who acts: cobbler, bread. 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 pragmatics
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, Story of Wali Dâd the Simple-Hearted, part 4, sentence 68

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But, industrious as he was, he could hardly buy bread and cheese for himself and his wife, and they grew thinner and thinner daily.

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**Who acts:** cobbler, bread · **What happens:** be, buy, grow · **To what, where:** bread

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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 (cobbler, bread), 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:pg3282:37:68
# text = But, industrious as he was, he could hardly buy bread and cheese for himself and his wife, and they grew thinner and thinner daily.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
3	industrious	industrious	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
4	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
5	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
9	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
10	hardly	hardly	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	buy	buy	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	parataxis	_	_
12	bread	bread	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	cheese	cheese	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	_
15	for	for	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	11	obl	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
18	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
22	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	grew	grow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
24	thinner	thin	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	23	xcomp	_	_
25	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
26	thinner	thin	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	24	conj	_	_
27	daily	daily	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | cobbler |  |  |  |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **buy** | could | cobbler | bread and cheese |  |  |  | for cobbler; hardly *property* | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent bread=Theme for himself=Beneficiary |
| 3 | **grow** | past | bread |  |  |  |  | daily, thin *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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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