---
title: After a while he spied the two giants lying asleep under a tree, and… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: After a while he spied the two giants lying asleep under a tree, and snoring till the very boughs bent with the breeze. Who acts: tailor, two giants. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brave Little Tailor, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Brave Little Tailor, sentence 90

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
After a while he spied the two giants lying asleep under a tree, and snoring till the very boughs bent with the breeze.

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**Who acts:** tailor, two giants · **What happens:** spy, lie, bend · **To what, where:** two giants, tree, boughs

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brave Little Tailor. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (tailor, two giants), 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:pg503:42:90
# text = After a while he spied the two giants lying asleep under a tree, and snoring till the very boughs bent with the breeze.
1	After	after	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	while	while	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	spied	spy	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	8	nummod	_	_
8	giants	giant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obj	_	_
9	lying	lie	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	8	acl	_	_
10	asleep	asleep	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	xcomp	_	_
11	under	under	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	snoring	snoring	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
17	till	till	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	very	very	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
20	boughs	bough	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nmod	_	_
21	bent	bend	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	20	acl	_	_
22	with	with	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	breeze	breeze	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **spy** | past | tailor | the two giants |  |  | while | snoring till the boughs *obl* | vn sight-30.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer giant=Stimulus |
| 2 | **lie** | gerund | the two giants *not said here* |  |  | a tree |  | asleep *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent under tree=Location |
| 3 | **bend** | participle |  | the boughs *not said here* |  |  |  | with the breeze | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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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