---
title: The Princess begged him very prettily to go lest the Troll should de… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The Princess begged him very prettily to go lest the Troll should devour him; but Halvor said, ‘Let him come when he will.’ Who acts: Princess, Troll, Halvor. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Soria Moria Castle, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, Soria Moria Castle, sentence 65

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The Princess begged him very prettily to go lest the Troll should devour him; but Halvor said, ‘Let him come when he will.’

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**Who acts:** Princess, Troll, Halvor · **What happens:** beg, go, devour, say, let, come · **To what, where:** Troll, Halvor · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Soria Moria Castle. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Princess, Troll, Halvor), 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:pg540:6:65
# text = The Princess begged him very prettily to go lest the Troll should devour him; but Halvor said, ‘Let him come when he will.’
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	Princess	Princess	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	begged	beg	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	obj	_	_
5	very	very	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	prettily	prettily	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	advcl	_	_
9	lest	lest	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	Troll	troll	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nsubj	_	_
12	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
13	devour	devour	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	advcl	_	_
14	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
16	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
17	Halvor	Halvor	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	_
18	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
20	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	Let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	ccomp	_	_
22	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obj	_	_
23	come	come	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	xcomp	_	_
24	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	26	advmod	_	_
25	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
26	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	23	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	21	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **beg** *speech: request* | past | the Princess |  | Troll |  |  | prettily *property* | vn beg-58.2-1-1 «NP V NP PP.Topic»: agent=Agent he=Recipient |
| 2 | **go** | to-infinitive | the Princess *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **devour** | should | the Troll | Halvor |  |  |  |  | vn devour-39.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Patient |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Halvor |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 5 | **let** | infinitive |  | Troll |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 6 | **come** | infinitive | Troll *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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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