---
title: It was the same to-day as yesterday: their shadows went before them… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: It was the same to-day as yesterday: their shadows went before them in the morning and followed them in the evening. Who acts: sight, shadows, sorrows. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 13, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 13, sentence 57

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It was the same to-day as yesterday: their shadows went before them in the morning and followed them in the evening.

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**Who acts:** sight, shadows, sorrows · **What happens:** be, go, follow, shadow · **To what, where:** shadows

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 13. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sight, shadows, sorrows), 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:pg3454:13:57
# text = It was the same to-day as yesterday: their shadows went before them in the morning and followed them in the evening.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	same	same	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
5	to	to	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
8	as	as	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	yesterday	yesterday	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	13	punct	_	_
11	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	shadows	shadow	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
13	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
14	before	before	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obl	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	morning	morning	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	followed	follow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	conj	_	_
21	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	_
22	in	in	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	evening	evening	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | sight |  |  |  | day | same *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **go** | past | sorrows's shadows |  |  |  | before sorrows *= sorrow*; morning |  | vn occur-48.3-2 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme before they=Location |
| 3 | **follow** | past | sorrows's shadows *not said here* | shadows *= shadow* |  |  | evening |  | vn chase-51.6 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |
| 4 | **shadow** |  | sorrows *= sorrow* |  |  |  |  |  | nom shadow «state transitive»: poss=agent |

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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 Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3454 (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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