---
title: When they reached the bank they flung her in, and watched her sink,… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When they reached the bank they flung her in, and watched her sink, after which they left her. Who acts: soldiers. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nettle Spinner, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Nettle Spinner, sentence 82

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When they reached the bank they flung her in, and watched her sink, after which they left her.

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**Who acts:** soldiers · **What happens:** reach, fling in, watch, leave · **To what, where:** bank, girl, sink

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nettle Spinner. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (soldiers), 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:pg540:42:82
# text = When they reached the bank they flung her in, and watched her sink, after which they left her.
1	When	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	3	mark	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	reached	reach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	advcl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	bank	bank	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	flung	fling	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	obj	_	_
9	in	in	ADP	RP	_	7	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	watched	watch	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	parataxis	_	_
13	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	sink	sink	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	after	after	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	19	obl	_	_
18	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	left	leave	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
20	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **reach** | past | soldiers *= soldier* | the bank |  |  |  |  | vn body\_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent bank=Theme |
| 2 | **fling in** | past | soldiers *= soldier* | girl |  |  |  |  | vn throw-17.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Theme |
| 3 | **watch** | past |  | girl's sink |  |  |  |  | vn assessment-34.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sink=Theme |
| 4 | **leave** | past | soldiers *= soldier* | girl |  |  |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=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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