---
title: ‘Before night,’ said he, ‘I shall have despatched all the rats in Ha… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Before night,’ said he, ‘I shall have despatched all the rats in Hamel if you will but pay me a _gros_ a head.’ Who acts: stranger, I. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Ratcatcher, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Ratcatcher, sentence 25

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‘Before night,’ said he, ‘I shall have despatched all the rats in Hamel if you will but pay me a \_gros\_ a head.’

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**Who acts:** stranger, I · **What happens:** say, despatch, pay · **To what, where:** rats, Hamel, gros, me · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Ratcatcher. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (stranger, I), 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:pg540:32:25
# text = ‘Before night,’ said he, ‘I shall have despatched all the rats in Hamel if you will but pay me a _gros_ a head.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Before	before	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
3	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
6	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
9	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
11	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
12	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	aux	_	_
13	despatched	despatch	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	6	ccomp	_	_
14	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	16	det:predet	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	rats	rat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	obj	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	Hamel	Hamel	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	16	nmod	_	_
19	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	21	mark	_	_
20	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
21	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	13	advcl	_	_
22	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
23	pay	pay	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	conj	_	_
24	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	iobj	_	_
25	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
26	_	_	PUNCT	``	_	27	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	gros	gros	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	_	_	PUNCT	NFP	_	30	punct	_	_
29	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
30	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | stranger |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **despatch** | shall · perfect | I | all rats |  | Hamel |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **pay** | infinitive | I *not said here* | a gros | me |  |  | a head *obl* | vn pay-68-1 «NP V NP NP»: agent=Agent i=Recipient gros=Asset |

<!-- .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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