---
title: He begged to know what was amiss, and she told him that all her plea… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He begged to know what was amiss, and she told him that all her pleasure in the hall was spoiled for the want of a roc’s egg hanging from the dome. Who acts: Aladdin, Princess, egg. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp, with its dependency tree and the p
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp, sentence 253

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He begged to know what was amiss, and she told him that all her pleasure in the hall was spoiled for the want of a roc’s egg hanging from the dome.

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**Who acts:** Aladdin, Princess, egg · **What happens:** beg, know, be, tell, spoil, hang · **To what, where:** Aladdin, pleasure, dome, hall, egg · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Aladdin, Princess, egg), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg503:983`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg503:12:253
# text = He begged to know what was amiss, and she told him that all her pleasure in the hall was spoiled for the want of a roc’s egg hanging from the dome.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	begged	beg	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	to	to	PART	TO	_	4	mark	_	_
4	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	xcomp	_	_
5	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	7	nsubj	_	_
6	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
7	amiss	amiss	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	ccomp	_	_
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
10	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
12	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	iobj	_	_
13	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	21	mark	_	_
14	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	16	det:predet	_	_
15	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
16	pleasure	pleasure	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nsubj:pass	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	hall	hall	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nmod	_	_
20	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux:pass	_	_
21	spoiled	spoil	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	11	ccomp	_	_
22	for	for	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	want	want	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	_
25	of	of	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	roc	roc	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	nmod:poss	_	_
28	’s	's	PART	POS	_	27	case	_	_
29	egg	egg	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nmod	_	_
30	hanging	hang	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	29	acl	_	_
31	from	from	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
32	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	33	det	_	_
33	dome	dome	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	30	obl	_	_
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **beg** *speech: request* | past | Aladdin |  |  |  |  |  | vn beg-58.2-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **know** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | Aladdin *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **is** | past |  |  |  |  |  | amiss *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | Princess |  | Aladdin |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent he=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 5 | **spoil** | past · passive |  | Princess's pleasure in the hall |  |  |  | for the want of a roc's egg | tree rules |
| 6 | **hang** | gerund | a roc's egg *not said here* |  |  | the dome |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 7 | **please** |  | Princess |  |  | the hall |  |  | nom pleasure «feeling transitive»: poss=agent in=place |
| 8 | **want** |  |  | a roc's egg |  |  |  |  | nom want «state transitive»: of=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.

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**Text:** «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 503 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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