---
title: Then he seized an iron rod and belabored the old man till he, whimpe… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Then he seized an iron rod and belabored the old man till he, whimpering, begged him to leave off, and he would give him great riches. Who acts: man. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Tale of a Youth Who Set Out to Learn What Fear Was, with its dependency tree and the pragmatic
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Tale of a Youth Who Set Out to Learn What Fear Was, sentence 170

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Then he seized an iron rod and belabored the old man till he, whimpering, begged him to leave off, and he would give him great riches.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** man · **What happens:** seize, belabor, whimper, beg, leave off, give · **To what, where:** iron rod, old man, man, great riches, person

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Tale of a Youth Who Set Out to Learn What Fear Was. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man), 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:pg503:13:170
# text = Then he seized an iron rod and belabored the old man till he, whimpering, begged him to leave off, and he would give him great riches.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	3	advmod	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	seized	seize	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	iron	iron	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	compound	_	_
6	rod	rod	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	belabored	belabor	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
12	till	till	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
15	whimpering	whimper	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
17	begged	beg	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
18	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	leave	leave	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	xcomp	_	_
21	off	off	ADP	RP	_	20	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
24	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
25	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	26	aux	_	_
26	give	give	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
27	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	iobj	_	_
28	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	29	amod	_	_
29	riches	rich	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	26	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **seize** | past | man | a iron rod |  |  | then |  | vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent rod=Theme |
| 2 | **belabor** | past | man *not said here* | the old man |  |  | till man |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **whimper** | gerund | man *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn animal\_sounds-38 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **beg** *speech: request* | past | man *not said here* |  | man |  |  |  | vn beg-58.2-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent he=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 5 | **leave off** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | man *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 6 | **give** | would | man | great riches | person |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent he=Recipient rich=Theme |

<!-- .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:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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