---
title: Then the old white rat sprang in his turn into the river, swam to th… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Then the old white rat sprang in his turn into the river, swam to the whirlpool and disappeared. Who acts: old white rat. 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 53

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Then the old white rat sprang in his turn into the river, swam to the whirlpool and disappeared.

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**Who acts:** old white rat · **What happens:** spring, swim, disappear · **To what, where:** turn, whirlpool

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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 (old white rat), 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:pg540:32:53
# text = Then the old white rat sprang in his turn into the river, swam to the whirlpool and disappeared.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	6	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
3	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
4	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	rat	rat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
6	sprang	spring	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	turn	turn	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
10	into	into	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	river	river	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
14	swam	swim	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
15	to	to	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	whirlpool	whirlpool	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	disappeared	disappear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **spring** | past | the old white rat |  |  | Blanchet's turn | then | into the river | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme into river=Destination |
| 2 | **swim** | past | the old white rat *not said here* |  |  | the whirlpool |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme to whirlpool=Destination |
| 3 | **disappear** | past | the old white rat *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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 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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