---
title: If you tell a lie to-day and say you struck a wolf, to-morrow surely… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: If you tell a lie to-day and say you struck a wolf, to-morrow surely it will eat you up.’ Who acts: you, morrow. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 8, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/8/51/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Lilac Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/) / [The Lilac Fairy Book, part 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/8/) / 51

# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 8, sentence 51

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
If you tell a lie to-day and say you struck a wolf, to-morrow surely it will eat you up.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** you, morrow · **What happens:** tell, say, strike, eat up · **To what, where:** lie, wolf, you · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 8. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, morrow), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg3454:8:51
# text = If you tell a lie to-day and say you struck a wolf, to-morrow surely it will eat you up.’
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	tell	tell	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	lie	lie	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	to	to	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	say	say	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
11	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	struck	strike	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	ccomp	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	wolf	wolf	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
16	to	to	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	morrow	morrow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
19	surely	surely	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
20	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
21	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
22	eat	eat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	advcl	_	_
23	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	22	obj	_	_
24	up	up	ADP	RP	_	22	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | present | you | a lie |  |  | day |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent lie=Recipient |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | you *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **strike** | past | you | a wolf |  |  |  | to morrow *result* | vn hit-18.1-1 «NP V NP PP.result»: agent=Agent wolf=Patient to morrow=Result |
| 4 | **eat up** | future | morrow | you |  |  |  | surely *property* | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent you=Patient |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 50](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/8/50/)
- next →: [sentence 52](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/8/52/)
- ↑ back to [The Lilac Fairy Book, part 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/8/)