---
title: In an instant the crystal prison flew into a thousand splinters, and… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: In an instant the crystal prison flew into a thousand splinters, and the old Fairy, taking the Dear Little Princess by the hand, said to the Prince: Who acts: crystal prison. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Hyacinth and the Dear Little Princess, with its dependency tree an
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, Prince Hyacinth and the Dear Little Princess, sentence 103

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
In an instant the crystal prison flew into a thousand splinters, and the old Fairy, taking the Dear Little Princess by the hand, said to the Prince:

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** crystal prison · **What happens:** fly, take, say · **To what, where:** instant, Dear Little Princess, Prince · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Hyacinth and the Dear Little Princess. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (crystal prison), 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:pg503:3:103
# text = In an instant the crystal prison flew into a thousand splinters, and the old Fairy, taking the Dear Little Princess by the hand, said to the Prince:
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	instant	instant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	crystal	crystal	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	prison	prison	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	flew	fly	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	into	into	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	thousand	thousand	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	11	nummod	_	_
11	splinters	splinter	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	Fairy	fairy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
18	taking	take	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	7	advcl	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
20	Dear	dear	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
21	Little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	Princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	_
23	by	by	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	hand	hand	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
27	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
28	to	to	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
30	Prince	Prince	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	27	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fly** | past | the crystal prison |  |  | a instant |  | into thousand splinters | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in instant=Location |
| 2 | **take** | gerund | the crystal prison *not said here* |  | the Dear Little Princess |  |  | by the hand | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP ADVP»: agent=Instrument princess=Destination |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the crystal prison *not said here* |  | the Prince |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to prince=Recipient |

<!-- .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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