---
title: There stood the tall birch tree with its drooping leaves; at the top… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: There stood the tall birch tree with its drooping leaves; at the top sat the old crow, and at its foot crept the gardener’s black cat. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 14, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 14, sentence 134

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
There stood the tall birch tree with its drooping leaves; at the top sat the old crow, and at its foot crept the gardener’s black cat.

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**What happens:** stand, droop, sit, creep · **To what, where:** tall birch tree, old crow, top, black cat, foot

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 14. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg3454:14:134
# text = There stood the tall birch tree with its drooping leaves; at the top sat the old crow, and at its foot crept the gardener’s black cat.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
4	tall	tall	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
5	birch	birch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	compound	_	_
6	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
7	with	with	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
9	drooping	droop	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	10	amod	_	_
10	leaves	leaf	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
12	at	at	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	top	top	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
15	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	crow	crow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
21	at	at	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	nmod:poss	_	_
23	foot	foot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obl	_	_
24	crept	creep	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	gardener	gardener	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	’s	's	PART	POS	_	26	case	_	_
28	black	black	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	29	amod	_	_
29	cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **stand** | past |  | the tall birch tree |  | there |  | with tree's drooping leaves | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer tree=Stimulus |
| 2 | **droop** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **sit** | past |  | the old crow |  | the top |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V NP.theme PP»: agent=Agent crow=Theme at top=Location |
| 4 | **creep** | past |  | the gardener's black cat |  | tree's foot |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Initial\_Location cat=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 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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