---
title: Well, the lady with the green hair kept on coaxing Maurice with soft… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Well, the lady with the green hair kept on coaxing Maurice with soft speeches, till at last she over persuaded him to promise to marry her, and be king over the fishes, great and small. Who acts: lady, Maurice. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 18, with 
---

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 18, sentence 57

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Well, the lady with the green hair kept on coaxing Maurice with soft speeches, till at last she over persuaded him to promise to marry her, and be king over the fishes, great and small.

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**Who acts:** lady, Maurice · **What happens:** keep, coax, persuade, promise, marry, be · **To what, where:** lady, Maurice, king

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 18. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lady, Maurice), 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:pg3454:18:57
# text = Well, the lady with the green hair kept on coaxing Maurice with soft speeches, till at last she over persuaded him to promise to marry her, and be king over the fishes, great and small.
1	Well	well	INTJ	UH	_	9	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	lady	lady	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj:pass	_	_
5	with	with	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	green	green	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	hair	hair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nmod	_	_
9	kept	keep	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
10	on	on	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
11	coaxing	coax	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	9	advcl	_	_
12	Maurice	Maurice	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
13	with	with	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	soft	soft	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	speeches	speech	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
17	till	till	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	at	at	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	last	last	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	advcl	_	_
20	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
21	over	over	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
22	persuaded	persuade	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	acl:relcl	_	_
23	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	obj	_	_
24	to	to	PART	TO	_	25	mark	_	_
25	promise	promise	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	xcomp	_	_
26	to	to	PART	TO	_	27	mark	_	_
27	marry	marry	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	25	xcomp	_	_
28	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	27	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
30	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	32	cc	_	_
31	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	32	cop	_	_
32	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	_
33	over	over	ADP	IN	_	35	case	_	_
34	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	35	det	_	_
35	fishes	fish	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	32	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	37	punct	_	_
37	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	32	parataxis	_	_
38	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	39	cc	_	_
39	small	small	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	37	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
40	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **keep** | participle · passive |  | the lady with the green hair |  |  |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme |
| 2 | **coax** | gerund |  | Maurice |  |  |  | with soft speeches | vn lure-59.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent maurice=Patient |
| 3 | **persuade** | past | lady | Maurice |  |  |  | over *property* | vn compel-59.1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent he=Patient clause=Result |
| 4 | **promise** *speech: promise* | to-infinitive | Maurice *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn promise-37.13 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 5 | **marry** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | Maurice *not said here* | lady |  |  |  |  | vn amalgamate-22.2-3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Patient |
| 6 | **is a** | infinitive |  | king |  |  |  | over the fishes | tree rules |

<!-- .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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