---
title: In one window I beheld four and twenty damsels, and the least fair o… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: In one window I beheld four and twenty damsels, and the least fair of them was fairer than Guenevere at her fairest. Who acts: I, least fair. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 30, 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/pg3454/30/14/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 30, sentence 14

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In one window I beheld four and twenty damsels, and the least fair of them was fairer than Guenevere at her fairest.

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**Who acts:** I, least fair · **What happens:** behold, be · **To what, where:** four damsels, one window, fairest

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 30. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, least fair), 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:pg3454:30:14
# text = In one window I beheld four and twenty damsels, and the least fair of them was fairer than Guenevere at her fairest.
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	3	nummod	_	_
3	window	window	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
4	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	beheld	behold	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	four	four	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	9	nummod	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	twenty	twenty	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	6	conj	_	_
9	damsels	damsel	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	least	least	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	14	amod	_	_
14	fair	fair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nmod	_	_
17	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	cop	_	_
18	fairer	fair	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	5	conj	_	_
19	than	than	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	Guenevere	Guenevere	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	_
21	at	at	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	nmod:poss	_	_
23	fairest	fair	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **behold** | past | I | four damsels |  | one window |  |  | vn sight-30.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer damsel=Stimulus |
| 2 | **is** | past | the least fair of damsels |  |  | whale's fairest |  | than Guenevere; fair *property* | 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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