---
title: The merchant started, and exclaimed: “If there were not brotherly af… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The merchant started, and exclaimed: “If there were not brotherly affection between us, I would cut off your head for asking me this!” Who acts: merchant. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 4, sentence 118

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The merchant started, and exclaimed: “If there were not brotherly affection between us, I would cut off your head for asking me this!”

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**Who acts:** merchant · **What happens:** start, exclaim, be, cut off, ask · **To what, where:** brotherly affection, head, this, merchant · **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 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (merchant), 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:pg3282:4:118
# text = The merchant started, and exclaimed: “If there were not brotherly affection between us, I would cut off your head for asking me this!”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	merchant	merchant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	started	start	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
5	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
6	exclaimed	exclaim	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	_
8	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
10	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	11	expl	_	_
11	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	cop	_	_
12	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	13	advmod	_	_
13	brotherly	brotherly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	affection	affection	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
15	between	between	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
18	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
19	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
20	cut	cut	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	parataxis	_	_
21	off	off	ADP	RP	_	20	compound:prt	_	_
22	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	nmod:poss	_	_
23	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obj	_	_
24	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	25	mark	_	_
25	asking	ask	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	20	advcl	_	_
26	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	25	iobj	_	_
27	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	25	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	20	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **start** | past | the merchant |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **exclaim** *speech: express* | past | the merchant *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is a** *in a quote* | past |  | brotherly affection |  |  |  | between us | tree rules |
| 4 | **cut off** *in a quote* | would | the merchant *= merchant* | your head |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: agent=Affector head=Eventuality |
| 5 | **ask** *speech: ask* *in a quote* | gerund | the merchant *= merchant* *not said here* | this | the merchant *= merchant* |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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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