---
title: As there was nothing to be done, they went in. — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: As there was nothing to be done, they went in. Who acts: nothing, things. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 23, 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/pg3454/23/130/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 23, sentence 130

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As there was nothing to be done, they went in.

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**Who acts:** nothing, things · **What happens:** be, do, go in

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 23. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nothing, things), 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:pg3454:23:130
# text = As there was nothing to be done, they went in.
1	As	as	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	3	expl	_	_
3	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	advcl	_	_
4	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	3	nsubj	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
6	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	aux:pass	_	_
7	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
9	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
10	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	in	in	ADV	RB	_	10	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | nothing |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **do** | to-infinitive · passive | nothing *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V» |
| 3 | **go in** | past | things *= thing* |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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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