---
title: ‘If I do,’ continued the knight, ‘I shall then meet a sort of fairy… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘If I do,’ continued the knight, ‘I shall then meet a sort of fairy armed with a needle of fire which burns to ashes all it touches. Who acts: knight, I, needle, fire. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 26, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of e
---

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 26, sentence 92

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘If I do,’ continued the knight, ‘I shall then meet a sort of fairy armed with a needle of fire which burns to ashes all it touches.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** knight, I, needle, fire · **What happens:** continue, meet, armed, burn, touch, sort · **To what, where:** sort, fairy, all

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 26. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (knight, I, needle, fire), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg3454:2382`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg3454:26:92
# text = ‘If I do,’ continued the knight, ‘I shall then meet a sort of fairy armed with a needle of fire which burns to ashes all it touches.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	_
2	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
3	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	do	do	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	15	advcl	_	_
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
7	continued	continue	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	parataxis	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	knight	knight	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
11	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
13	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
14	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	15	advmod	_	_
15	meet	meet	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	sort	sort	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
18	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	fairy	fairy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	_
20	armed	armed	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	19	acl	_	_
21	with	with	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	needle	needle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nmod	_	_
26	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	27	nsubj	_	_
27	burns	burn	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	acl:relcl	_	_
28	to	to	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
29	ashes	ash	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	27	obl	_	_
30	all	all	PRON	DT	PronType=Tot	27	obj	_	_
31	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	32	nsubj	_	_
32	touches	touch	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	30	acl:relcl	_	_
33	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **continue** | past | the knight |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **meet** | shall | I | a sort of fairy |  |  | then |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sort=Co-Agent |
| 3 | **armed** | participle |  | fairy *not said here* |  |  |  | with a needle of fire | tree rules |
| 4 | **burn** | present | a needle of fire | all |  |  |  | to ashes | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent all=Theme |
| 5 | **touch** | present | fire |  |  |  |  |  | vn contiguous\_location-47.8-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 6 | **sort** |  |  | fairy |  |  |  |  | nom sort «cognition transitive»: of=patient |

<!-- .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:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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