---
title: On the third day she looked out o’ the back door, and saw a coach-an… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: On the third day she looked out o’ the back door, and saw a coach-and-four coming along the road. Who acts: sister, coach. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Black Bull of Norroway, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The Black Bull of Norroway, sentence 17

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On the third day she looked out o’ the back door, and saw a coach-and-four coming along the road.

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**Who acts:** sister, coach · **What happens:** look out, see, come · **To what, where:** coach, road

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Black Bull of Norroway. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sister, coach), 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:pg503:55:17
# text = On the third day she looked out o’ the back door, and saw a coach-and-four coming along the road.
1	On	on	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	third	third	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	4	amod	_	_
4	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
5	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	out	out	ADP	RP	_	6	compound:prt	_	_
8	o	of	ADP	IN	Abbr=Yes	12	mark	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
11	back	back	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
12	door	door	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
15	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	coach	coach	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	four	four	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	17	conj	_	_
22	coming	come	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	17	acl	_	_
23	along	along	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	road	road	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **look out** | past | sister |  |  |  | day |  | vn caring-75.2-2 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **see** | past | sister *not said here* | a coach |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer coach=Stimulus |
| 3 | **come** | gerund | a coach *not said here* |  |  | the road |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme along road=Initial\_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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