---
title: He found them both sitting on the stairs, while beside them the beer… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He found them both sitting on the stairs, while beside them the beer was running all over the ground from the tap, which was wide open. Who acts: father, both, beer, tap. 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 9

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He found them both sitting on the stairs, while beside them the beer was running all over the ground from the tap, which was wide open.

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**Who acts:** father, both, beer, tap · **What happens:** find, sit, run, be · **To what, where:** wife, stairs, ground · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (father, both, beer, tap), 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:pg540:28:9
# text = He found them both sitting on the stairs, while beside them the beer was running all over the ground from the tap, which was wide open.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	found	find	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	obj	_	_
4	both	both	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	5	nsubj	_	_
5	sitting	sit	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	2	ccomp	_	_
6	on	on	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	stairs	stair	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
10	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
11	beside	beside	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obl	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	beer	beer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
15	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	running	run	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	5	conj	_	_
17	all	all	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
18	over	over	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	ground	ground	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	_
21	from	from	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	tap	tap	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
25	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	28	nsubj	_	_
26	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	28	cop	_	_
27	wide	wide	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	28	advmod	_	_
28	open	open	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **find** | past | father | wife |  |  |  |  | vn declare-29.4-1-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Agent they=Attribute clause=Theme |
| 2 | **sit** | gerund | both |  |  | the stairs |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on stair=Location |
| 3 | **run** | past · progressive | the beer |  |  | the ground |  | beside wife; from the tap | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme beside they=Trajectory |
| 4 | **is** | past | the tap |  |  |  |  | open *property* | tree rules |

<!-- .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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