---
title: ‘It would be much better if you held them in your hands,’ said the y… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘It would be much better if you held them in your hands,’ said the young man, ‘and then put your legs one after the other in each hole.’ Who acts: air, you. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Six Sillies, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Six Sillies, sentence 38

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘It would be much better if you held them in your hands,’ said the young man, ‘and then put your legs one after the other in each hole.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** air, you · **What happens:** be, hold, say, put · **To what, where:** legs, hands, young man · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Six Sillies. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (air, you), 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:pg540:28:38
# text = ‘It would be much better if you held them in your hands,’ said the young man, ‘and then put your legs one after the other in each hole.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
3	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
4	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	cop	_	_
5	much	much	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	0	root	_	_
7	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
8	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	held	hold	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	advcl	_	_
10	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	obj	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	hands	hand	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	16	punct	_	_
16	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	parataxis	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
21	‘	‘	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
23	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	24	advmod	_	_
24	put	put	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	conj	_	_
25	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	legs	leg	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	obj	_	_
27	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	24	obj	_	_
28	after	after	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
30	other	other	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	obl	_	_
31	in	in	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
32	each	each	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	33	det	_	_
33	hole	hole	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	30	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | would | air |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **hold** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | you | legs *= leg* |  | your hands |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent they=Theme in hand=Location |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the young man and ‘ |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent man=Topic |
| 4 | **put** | infinitive |  | your legs |  |  | after the other; then |  | vn invest-13.5.4-1 «NP V NP PP.goal»: agent=Agent leg=Asset one=Goal |

<!-- .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 Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 540 (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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