---
title: But he had put it off from day to day, hoping always for a better op… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But he had put it off from day to day, hoping always for a better opportunity, and now this was the end! Who acts: man, this. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 19, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/19/33/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 19, sentence 33

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But he had put it off from day to day, hoping always for a better opportunity, and now this was the end!

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**Who acts:** man, this · **What happens:** put off, hope, be · **To what, where:** poverty, end

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 19. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, this), 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:pg3454:19:33
# text = But he had put it off from day to day, hoping always for a better opportunity, and now this was the end!
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	put	put	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	off	off	ADP	RP	_	4	compound:prt	_	_
7	from	from	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
9	to	to	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
12	hoping	hope	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	advcl	_	_
13	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	12	advmod	_	_
14	for	for	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
15	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
16	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	17	amod	_	_
17	opportunity	opportunity	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
20	now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	24	advmod	_	_
21	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	24	nsubj	_	_
22	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	cop	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	end	end	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	conj	_	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 | **put off** | past · perfect | man | poverty |  |  | day |  | vn invest-13.5.4-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent it=Goal |
| 2 | **hope** | gerund | man *not said here* |  |  |  |  | for a better opportunity and the end; always *property* | vn long-32.2 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Pivot for opportunity=Theme |
| 3 | **is a** | past | this | the end |  |  | now |  | 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 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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