---
title: He hastened to set them free, and he asked who had treated them in s… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He hastened to set them free, and he asked who had treated them in so evil a manner. Who acts: king. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 9, 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/pg3454/9/65/)

<!-- 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 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/9/) / 65

# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 9, sentence 65

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He hastened to set them free, and he asked who had treated them in so evil a manner.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** king · **What happens:** hasten, set, ask, treat · **To what, where:** servants, manner · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (king), 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:pg3454:9:65
# text = He hastened to set them free, and he asked who had treated them in so evil a manner.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	hastened	hasten	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	to	to	PART	TO	_	4	mark	_	_
4	set	set	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	xcomp	_	_
5	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	free	free	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
9	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
10	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
11	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	13	nsubj:pass	_	_
12	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
13	treated	treat	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	ccomp	_	_
14	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obj	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
16	so	so	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
17	evil	evil	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	19	det:predet	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	manner	manner	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hasten** | past | king |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **set** | to-infinitive | king *not said here* | servants *= servant* |  |  |  | free *property* | vn other\_cos-45.4-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Patient they=Result |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | king |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **treat** | past · perfect · passive |  | servants *= servant* |  | evil manner |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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 64](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/9/64/)
- next →: [sentence 66](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/9/66/)
- ↑ back to [The Lilac Fairy Book, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/9/)