---
title: The lions will be so busy eating they will let you pass by them.” — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The lions will be so busy eating they will let you pass by them.” Who acts: lions, eating, you. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Paribanou, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Story of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Paribanou, part 4, sentence 58

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The lions will be so busy eating they will let you pass by them.”

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**Who acts:** lions, eating, you · **What happens:** be, eat, let, pass · **To what, where:** Lions, you

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Paribanou, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lions, eating, you), 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:pg503:52:58
# text = The lions will be so busy eating they will let you pass by them.”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	lions	lion	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nsubj	_	_
3	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
4	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	cop	_	_
5	so	so	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	busy	busy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
7	eating	eat	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	10	csubj	_	_
8	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	obj	_	_
9	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
10	let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	parataxis	_	_
11	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	10	obj	_	_
12	pass	pass	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	xcomp	_	_
13	by	by	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | future | the lions |  |  |  |  | busy *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **eat** | gerund |  | Lions *= lion* |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Patient |
| 3 | **let** | future | eating | you |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **pass** | infinitive | you *not said here* |  |  |  |  | by Lions *= lion* | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme by they=Location |

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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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