---
title: So she sprang to them; but no sooner had she touched one of them tha… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: So she sprang to them; but no sooner had she touched one of them than she stuck fast to her. Who acts: sister. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Golden Goose, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Golden Goose, sentence 32

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So she sprang to them; but no sooner had she touched one of them than she stuck fast to her.

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**Who acts:** sister · **What happens:** spring, touch, stick · **To what, where:** daughters, one, landlord

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Golden Goose. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sister), 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:pg540:48:32
# text = So she sprang to them; but no sooner had she touched one of them than she stuck fast to her.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
2	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	sprang	spring	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
7	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
8	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	9	det	_	_
9	sooner	soon	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	12	advmod	_	_
10	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
11	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	touched	touch	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
13	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	obj	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nmod	_	_
16	than	than	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
17	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	stuck	stick	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	advcl	_	_
19	fast	fast	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	18	advmod	_	_
20	to	to	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **spring** | past | sister |  | daughters *= daughter* |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme to they=Destination |
| 2 | **touch** | past | sister | one of daughters |  |  |  | soon *property* | vn contiguous\_location-47.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme one=Co-Theme |
| 3 | **stick** | past | sister |  | landlord |  |  | fast *property* | vn shake-22.3-2 «NP V NP PP»: agent=Agent to she=Co-Patient |

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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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