---
title: By this time the cattle were all tied up again, but as the people co… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: By this time the cattle were all tied up again, but as the people could not find their nuts they sat round the fire and began to tell stories. Who acts: nuts. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every claus
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/2/1/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 2, sentence 1

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By this time the cattle were all tied up again, but as the people could not find their nuts they sat round the fire and began to tell stories.

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**Who acts:** nuts · **What happens:** tie up, not find, sit, begin, tell · **To what, where:** cattle, stories · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nuts), 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:pg3454:2:1
# text = By this time the cattle were all tied up again, but as the people could not find their nuts they sat round the fire and began to tell stories.
1	By	by	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	3	det	_	_
3	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	cattle	cattle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	nsubj:pass	_	_
6	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux:pass	_	_
7	all	all	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
8	tied	tie	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
9	up	up	ADP	RP	_	8	compound:prt	_	_
10	again	again	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
12	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
13	as	as	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	18	obl	_	_
16	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
17	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	18	advmod	_	_
18	find	find	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	advcl	_	_
19	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	nuts	nut	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	nsubj	_	_
21	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
22	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	ccomp	_	_
23	round	round	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	_
26	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
27	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	22	conj	_	_
28	to	to	PART	TO	_	29	mark	_	_
29	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	27	xcomp	_	_
30	stories	story	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	29	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tie up** | past · passive |  | the cattle |  |  | again; time | all *property* | vn mix-22.1-2 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient |
| 2 | **not** **find** | could |  |  |  |  |  | as the people | vn declare-29.4-1-1 «NP V what S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 3 | **sit** | past | cattle's nuts |  |  |  |  | round the fire | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **begin** | past | cattle's nuts *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 5 | **tell** *speech: assert* | to-infinitive | cattle's nuts *not said here* | stories |  |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent story=Recipient |

<!-- .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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