---
title: “Princess,” said he, “you at least can never need this water, but I… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: “Princess,” said he, “you at least can never need this water, but I am an unhappy ambassador, whose death you desire. Who acts: Princess, man, you, unhappy ambassador. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Pretty Goldilocks, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of e
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Story of Pretty Goldilocks, sentence 148

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
“Princess,” said he, “you at least can never need this water, but I am an unhappy ambassador, whose death you desire.

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**Who acts:** Princess, man, you, unhappy ambassador · **What happens:** say, not need, be, desire, die · **To what, where:** water, unhappy ambassador, death · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Pretty Goldilocks. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Princess, man, you, unhappy ambassador), 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:pg503:28:148
# text = “Princess,” said he, “you at least can never need this water, but I am an unhappy ambassador, whose death you desire.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
5	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
8	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
10	at	at	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	least	least	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	9	obl	_	_
12	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	14	advmod	_	_
14	need	need	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	ccomp	_	_
15	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	16	det	_	_
16	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
18	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
19	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
20	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	cop	_	_
21	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
22	unhappy	unhappy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	amod	_	_
23	ambassador	ambassador	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
25	whose	whose	PRON	WP$	Poss=Yes|PronType=Rel	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	death	death	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	appos	_	_
27	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
28	desire	desire	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	26	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Princess |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **not** **need** *in a quote* | can | man | this water |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot water=Theme |
| 3 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | Princess | a unhappy ambassador |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **desire** *in a quote* | present | you | a unhappy ambassador's death *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot death=Theme |
| 5 | **die** *in a quote* |  | a unhappy ambassador |  |  |  |  |  | nom death «event intransitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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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