---
title: Number three asked: “Is there no way of escape, then?” — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Number three asked: “Is there no way of escape, then?” Who acts: Number. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Trusty John, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, Trusty John, sentence 74

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Number three asked: “Is there no way of escape, then?”

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**Who acts:** Number · **What happens:** ask, be · **To what, where:** way · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Trusty John. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Number), 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:pg503:41:74
# text = Number three asked: “Is there no way of escape, then?”
1	Number	number	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
2	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	1	flat	_	_
3	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	9	punct	_	_
5	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	Is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
7	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	6	expl	_	_
8	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	9	det	_	_
9	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	ccomp	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	escape	escape	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
13	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	3	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | Number |  |  |  | then |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **is a** *in a quote* | present |  | no way |  |  |  | of escape | 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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