---
title: If John can catch me by the hand or cloak when I ride by, and has co… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: If John can catch me by the hand or cloak when I ride by, and has courage not to let go his grip, I’ll be safe. Who acts: John, I, courage. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 6, 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/pg3454/6/107/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 6, sentence 107

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If John can catch me by the hand or cloak when I ride by, and has courage not to let go his grip, I’ll be safe.

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**Who acts:** John, I, courage · **What happens:** catch, ride by, have, not let, go, be · **To what, where:** me, courage, grip

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (John, I, courage), 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:pg3454:6:107
# text = If John can catch me by the hand or cloak when I ride by, and has courage not to let go his grip, I’ll be safe.
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	John	John	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	catch	catch	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	29	advcl	_	_
5	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	by	by	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	hand	hand	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
9	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	cloak	cloak	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	conj	_	_
11	when	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	13	mark	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	ride	ride	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	_
14	by	by	ADP	IN	_	13	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	has	have	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
18	courage	courage	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	_
19	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	21	advmod	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	xcomp	_	_
22	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	xcomp	_	_
23	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	24	nmod:poss	_	_
24	grip	grip	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
26	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	29	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	’ll	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	29	aux	_	_
28	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	29	cop	_	_
29	safe	safe	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	29	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **catch** *a condition, not said to happen* | can | John | me |  |  |  | by the hand or cloak | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Theme |
| 2 | **ride by** | present | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2 «NP.agent V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **have** | present | John *not said here* | courage |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **not** **let** | to-infinitive | courage *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **go** | infinitive | courage *not said here* | John's grip |  |  |  |  | vn meander-47.7 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location grip=Theme |
| 6 | **is** | future | I |  |  |  |  | safe *property* | tree rules |
| 7 | **grip** |  | John |  |  |  |  |  | nom grip «act transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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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