---
title: He left off tearing at the iron bars of the cage in which he was shu… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He left off tearing at the iron bars of the cage in which he was shut up, and became as gentle as a lamb. Who acts: Darling. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Darling, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg503/39/113/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Blue Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg503/) / [Prince Darling](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg503/39/) / 113

# The Blue Fairy Book, Prince Darling, sentence 113

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He left off tearing at the iron bars of the cage in which he was shut up, and became as gentle as a lamb.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Darling · **What happens:** leave off, tear, shut up, become · **To what, where:** iron bars, Darling, cage

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (Darling), 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:pg503:39:113
# text = He left off tearing at the iron bars of the cage in which he was shut up, and became as gentle as a lamb.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	left	leave	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	off	off	ADP	RP	_	2	compound:prt	_	_
4	tearing	tear	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	2	xcomp	_	_
5	at	at	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	iron	iron	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	compound	_	_
8	bars	bar	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	cage	cage	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	_
12	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	16	obl	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
15	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux:pass	_	_
16	shut	shut	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	11	acl:relcl	_	_
17	up	up	ADP	RP	_	16	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	became	become	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
21	as	as	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
22	gentle	gentle	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	xcomp	_	_
23	as	as	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	lamb	lamb	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **leave off** | past | Darling |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **tear** | gerund | Darling *not said here* |  |  | the iron bars of the cage |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme at bar=Trajectory |
| 3 | **shut up** | past · passive |  | Darling |  | the cage |  |  | vn subjugate-42.3 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient |
| 4 | **become** | past | Darling *not said here* |  |  |  |  | gentle *property* | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 112](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg503/39/112/)
- next →: [sentence 114](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg503/39/114/)
- ↑ back to [Prince Darling](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg503/39/)