---
title: But the truth was she was afraid lest the horse should speak and tel… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But the truth was she was afraid lest the horse should speak and tell how she had treated the Princess. Who acts: truth, horse. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Goose-girl, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Goose-girl, sentence 35

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But the truth was she was afraid lest the horse should speak and tell how she had treated the Princess.

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**Who acts:** truth, horse · **What happens:** be, speak, tell, treat · **To what, where:** horse · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Goose-girl. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (truth, horse), 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:pg503:37:35
# text = But the truth was she was afraid lest the horse should speak and tell how she had treated the Princess.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	truth	truth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
5	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
6	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
7	afraid	afraid	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
8	lest	lest	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	horse	horse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
11	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
12	speak	speak	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	ccomp	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	conj	_	_
15	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	18	advmod	_	_
16	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj:pass	_	_
17	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
18	treated	treat	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	14	ccomp	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	Princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the truth |  |  |  |  | afraid *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **speak** *speech: other* | should | the horse |  |  |  |  |  | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **tell** *speech: assert* | infinitive | the horse *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **treat** | past · perfect · passive |  | horse |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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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