---
title: While he was washing the King passed by, and the Cat began to cry out: — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: While he was washing the King passed by, and the Cat began to cry out: Who acts: cat. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Cat; Or, Puss in Boots, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Master Cat; Or, Puss in Boots, sentence 29

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While he was washing the King passed by, and the Cat began to cry out:

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**Who acts:** cat · **What happens:** wash, pass by, begin, cry out · **To what, where:** King

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Cat; Or, Puss in Boots. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (cat), 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:pg503:21:29
# text = While he was washing the King passed by, and the Cat began to cry out:
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	washing	wash	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	7	advcl	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	passed	pass	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
8	by	by	ADP	IN	_	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	Cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nsubj	_	_
13	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
14	to	to	PART	TO	_	15	mark	_	_
15	cry	cry	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	xcomp	_	_
16	out	out	ADP	RP	_	15	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **wash** | past · progressive | cat | the King |  |  |  |  | vn floss-41.2.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent king=Patient |
| 2 | **pass by** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **begin** | past | the Cat |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 4 | **cry out** *speech: express* | to-infinitive | the Cat *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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 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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