---
title: ‘Yes, a bird flew over the roof with a Christian man’s bone in his b… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Yes, a bird flew over the roof with a Christian man’s bone in his bill, and let it fall down our chimney,’ answered the Princess. Who acts: bird, man. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Mother Holle, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, Mother Holle, part 3, sentence 25

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‘Yes, a bird flew over the roof with a Christian man’s bone in his bill, and let it fall down our chimney,’ answered the Princess.

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**Who acts:** bird, man · **What happens:** fly, let, fall down, answer, bill · **To what, where:** roof, bird, chimney, Princess

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Mother Holle, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (bird, man), 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:pg540:46:25
# text = ‘Yes, a bird flew over the roof with a Christian man’s bone in his bill, and let it fall down our chimney,’ answered the Princess.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Yes	yes	INTJ	UH	Polarity=Pos	6	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
6	flew	fly	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	over	over	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	roof	roof	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
10	with	with	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
11	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	Christian	Christian	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	’s	's	PART	POS	_	13	case	_	_
15	bone	bone	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	bill	bill	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	let	let	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
22	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obj	_	_
23	fall	fall	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	xcomp	_	_
24	down	down	ADP	RP	_	23	compound:prt	_	_
25	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	chimney	chimney	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	29	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	29	punct	_	_
29	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
30	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
31	Princess	Princess	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	29	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fly** | past | a bird |  |  | the roof |  | with a Christian man's bone in man's bill | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V NP.theme PP»: agent=Agent over roof=Location |
| 2 | **let** | infinitive | a bird *not said here* | bird |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **fall down** | infinitive | bird *not said here* | our chimney |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past | a bird *not said here* |  | the Princess |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent princess=Eventuality |
| 5 | **bill** |  | man |  |  |  |  |  | nom bill «communication transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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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