---
title: But so merry were the mice they did not hear the “king, king” of sle… — Old Indian Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: But so merry were the mice they did not hear the “king, king” of sleepy birds, disturbed by the unaccustomed fire. Who acts: merry mice. A sentence of «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Dance in a Buffalo Skull, 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/pg338/11/23/)

<!-- 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/) / [Old Indian Legends](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/) / [Dance in a Buffalo Skull](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/11/) / 23

# Old Indian Legends, Dance in a Buffalo Skull, sentence 23

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But so merry were the mice they did not hear the “king, king” of sleepy birds, disturbed by the unaccustomed fire.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** merry mice · **What happens:** be, not hear, disturb · **To what, where:** merry mice, king, sleepy birds

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Dance in a Buffalo Skull. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (merry mice), 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:pg338:11:23
# text = But so merry were the mice they did not hear the “king, king” of sleepy birds, disturbed by the unaccustomed fire.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
2	so	so	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	merry	merry	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
4	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	mice	mouse	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nsubj	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
8	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
9	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	10	advmod	_	_
10	hear	hear	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
15	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	15	punct	_	_
17	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	sleepy	sleepy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
21	disturbed	disturb	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	19	acl	_	_
22	by	by	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
24	unaccustomed	unaccustomed	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	amod	_	_
25	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past |  | the merry mice |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **not** **hear** | past · do-support | the merry mice | the king |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer king=Stimulus |
| 3 | **disturb** | participle |  | sleepy birds *not said here* |  |  |  | by the unaccustomed fire | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Experiencer |

<!-- .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:** «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Project Gutenberg book 338 (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 22](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/11/22/)
- next →: [sentence 24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/11/24/)
- ↑ back to [Dance in a Buffalo Skull](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/11/)