---
title: Once in the spring, a little before Midsummer, Walter heard that the… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Once in the spring, a little before Midsummer, Walter heard that there were a great many wolves in the wood, and that pleased him. Who acts: Walter, great many wolves. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 7, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of ev
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/7/115/)

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 7, sentence 115

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Once in the spring, a little before Midsummer, Walter heard that there were a great many wolves in the wood, and that pleased him.

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**Who acts:** Walter, great many wolves · **What happens:** hear, be · **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 7. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Walter, great many wolves), 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:pg3454:7:115
# text = Once in the spring, a little before Midsummer, Walter heard that there were a great many wolves in the wood, and that pleased him.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	12	advmod	_	_
2	in	in	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	spring	spring	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	appos	_	_
8	before	before	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	Midsummer	Midsummer	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
11	Walter	Walter	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
12	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
14	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	15	expl	_	_
15	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	ccomp	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
17	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
18	many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	wolves	wolf	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nsubj	_	_
20	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	wood	wood	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
25	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	26	nsubj	_	_
26	pleased	pleased	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	ccomp	_	_
27	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hear** | past | Walter |  |  |  |  | once *property* | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 2 | **be** | past | a great many wolves in the wood |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=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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