---
title: If there was nothing else for him to do, he said he would fetch wood… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: If there was nothing else for him to do, he said he would fetch wood and water for the kitchen-maid, and that he obtained leave to do. Who acts: nothing, boy. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Mother Holle, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, Mother Holle, part 1, sentence 109

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If there was nothing else for him to do, he said he would fetch wood and water for the kitchen-maid, and that he obtained leave to do.

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**Who acts:** nothing, boy · **What happens:** be, do, say, fetch, obtain · **To what, where:** wood, leave · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Mother Holle, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nothing, boy), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg540:3611`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg540:44:109
# text = If there was nothing else for him to do, he said he would fetch wood and water for the kitchen-maid, and that he obtained leave to do.
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	3	expl	_	_
3	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	advcl	_	_
4	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	3	nsubj	_	_
5	else	else	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
6	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
7	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
8	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
9	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	acl	_	_
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
11	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
14	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
15	fetch	fetch	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	ccomp	_	_
16	wood	wood	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
18	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	conj	_	_
19	for	for	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
21	kitchen	kitchen	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	compound	_	_
22	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	21	punct	_	_
23	maid	maid	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
25	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
26	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	31	obj	_	_
27	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
28	obtained	obtain	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
29	leave	leave	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obj	_	_
30	to	to	PART	TO	_	31	mark	_	_
31	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	29	acl	_	_
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | nothing |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **do** | to-infinitive | boy |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | boy |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **fetch** | would | boy | wood and water |  |  |  | for the kitchen maid | vn get-13.5.1-1 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent wood=Theme for maid=Beneficiary |
| 5 | **obtain** | past | boy | leave |  |  |  |  | vn obtain-13.5.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent leave=Theme |
| 6 | **do** | to-infinitive | boy *not said here* | leave |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent that=Eventuality |

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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:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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