---
title: They became fast friends, and told each other about their homes and… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: They became fast friends, and told each other about their homes and their children, and how to teach them all they ought to know. Who acts: sharks. 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 clause.
---

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 5, sentence 39

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They became fast friends, and told each other about their homes and their children, and how to teach them all they ought to know.

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**Who acts:** sharks · **What happens:** become, tell, teach, know · **To what, where:** fast friends, each, sharks · **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 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sharks), 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:pg3454:5:39
# text = They became fast friends, and told each other about their homes and their children, and how to teach them all they ought to know.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	became	become	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	fast	fast	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	friends	friend	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
7	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
8	each	each	DET	DT	ExtPos=PRON|PronType=Rcp	7	obj	_	_
9	other	other	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	fixed	_	_
10	about	about	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	homes	home	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obl	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
14	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
18	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	20	advmod	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	teach	teach	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	conj	_	_
21	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	_
22	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	21	nmod:unmarked	_	_
23	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
24	ought	ought	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	20	ccomp	_	_
25	to	to	PART	TO	_	26	mark	_	_
26	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	24	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **become** | past | sharks *= shark* | fast friends |  |  |  |  | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past |  | each |  |  |  | about sharks's homes and sharks's children | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_ING»: agent=Agent each=Recipient about home=Topic |
| 3 | **teach** *speech: other* | to-infinitive |  |  | sharks *= shark* |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent they=Recipient |
| 4 | **know** | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |

<!-- .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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