---
title: While he was looking out for a nice shady place where he might perch… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: While he was looking out for a nice shady place where he might perch comfortably he noticed a shark watching him from below with greedy eyes. Who acts: tide, shark. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 5, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/5/25/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 5, sentence 25

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While he was looking out for a nice shady place where he might perch comfortably he noticed a shark watching him from below with greedy eyes.

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**Who acts:** tide, shark · **What happens:** look out, notice, watch · **To what, where:** shark, tide

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (tide, shark), 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:pg3454:5:25
# text = While he was looking out for a nice shady place where he might perch comfortably he noticed a shark watching him from below with greedy eyes.
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	looking	look	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	out	out	ADP	RP	_	4	compound:prt	_	_
6	for	for	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
8	nice	nice	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
9	shady	shady	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	place	place	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
11	where	where	ADV	WRB	PronType=Rel	15	advmod	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
13	might	might	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
14	perch	perch	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	comfortably	comfortably	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
16	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
17	noticed	notice	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	advcl	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	shark	shark	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	_
20	watching	watch	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	19	acl	_	_
21	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	_
22	from	from	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	below	below	ADV	RB	_	20	obl	_	_
24	with	with	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	greedy	greedy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	amod	_	_
26	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **look out** | past · progressive | tide |  |  |  |  | for a nice shady place | vn caring-75.2-2 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent for place=Theme |
| 2 | **notice** | past | tide | a shark |  |  |  | comfortably *property* | vn see-30.1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer shark=Stimulus |
| 3 | **watch** | gerund | a shark *not said here* | tide |  |  |  | with greedy eyes | vn assessment-34.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=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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