---
title: At last he flung him into the Governor’s goose-house, and the geese… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: At last he flung him into the Governor’s goose-house, and the geese began to hiss and peck at him, till he felt more dead than alive. Who acts: Priest, geese. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Thief, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Master Thief, sentence 146

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At last he flung him into the Governor’s goose-house, and the geese began to hiss and peck at him, till he felt more dead than alive.

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**Who acts:** Priest, geese · **What happens:** fling, begin, hiss, peck, feel · **To what, where:** Lawrence, last

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Thief. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Priest, geese), 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:pg540:9:146
# text = At last he flung him into the Governor’s goose-house, and the geese began to hiss and peck at him, till he felt more dead than alive.
1	At	at	ADP	IN	_	2	case	_	_
2	last	last	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
3	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	flung	fling	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	into	into	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	Governor	Governor	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’s	's	PART	POS	_	8	case	_	_
10	goose	goose	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	geese	goose	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	nsubj	_	_
17	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
18	to	to	PART	TO	_	19	mark	_	_
19	hiss	hiss	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	xcomp	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	peck	peck	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	conj	_	_
22	at	at	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
25	till	till	SCONJ	IN	_	27	mark	_	_
26	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	27	nsubj	_	_
27	felt	feel	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	conj	_	_
28	more	more	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	29	amod	_	_
29	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	xcomp	_	_
30	than	than	ADP	IN	_	31	case	_	_
31	alive	alive	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fling** | past | Priest | Lawrence |  | last |  | into the Governor's goose house | vn throw-17.1-1 «NP V NP PP.destinations»: agent=Agent he=Theme at last=Destination |
| 2 | **begin** | past | the geese |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 3 | **hiss** | to-infinitive | the geese *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **peck** | infinitive | the geese *not said here* |  |  |  |  | at Priest | vn chew-39.2 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent at he=Patient |
| 5 | **feel** | past | Priest |  |  |  |  | than alive; dead *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus |

<!-- .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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