---
title: If you had refused to help me I should have been certain that you we… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: If you had refused to help me I should have been certain that you were wicked. Who acts: you, I. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Darling, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, Prince Darling, sentence 11

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If you had refused to help me I should have been certain that you were wicked.

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**Who acts:** you, I · **What happens:** refuse, not help, be · **To what, where:** me

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Darling. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, I), 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:pg503:39:11
# text = If you had refused to help me I should have been certain that you were wicked.
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	refused	refuse	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	12	advcl	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	xcomp	_	_
7	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	_
8	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
9	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
10	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	aux	_	_
11	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	12	cop	_	_
12	certain	certain	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
13	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
14	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
15	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	cop	_	_
16	wicked	wicked	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **refuse** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · perfect | you |  |  |  |  |  | vn reject-77.2 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 2 | **not** **help** | to-infinitive | you *not said here* |  | me |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Beneficiary |
| 3 | **is** | should · perfect | I |  |  |  |  | certain *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **is** | past | you |  |  |  |  | wicked *property* | 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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