---
title: It was not a bad guess, but the fir-tree had real bark-ache from she… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: It was not a bad guess, but the fir-tree had real bark-ache from sheer longing, and bark-ache in trees is just as bad as head-ache in human beings. Who acts: wood, fir tree, bark ache. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 11, with its dependency tree and the 
---

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 11, sentence 69

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It was not a bad guess, but the fir-tree had real bark-ache from sheer longing, and bark-ache in trees is just as bad as head-ache in human beings.

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**Who acts:** wood, fir tree, bark ache · **What happens:** not be, ache, be · **To what, where:** bad guess, sheer longing

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This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 11. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wood, fir tree, bark ache), 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:pg5615:11:69
# text = It was not a bad guess, but the fir-tree had real bark-ache from sheer longing, and bark-ache in trees is just as bad as head-ache in human beings.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	6	advmod	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	bad	bad	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	guess	guess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
8	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
10	fir	fir	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nsubj	_	_
13	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
14	real	real	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
15	bark	bark	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	ache	ache	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	parataxis	_	_
18	from	from	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	sheer	sheer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	compound	_	_
20	longing	longing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
23	bark	bark	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	23	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	ache	ache	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	31	nsubj	_	_
26	in	in	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	trees	tree	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nmod	_	_
28	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	31	cop	_	_
29	just	just	ADV	RB	_	31	advmod	_	_
30	as	as	ADV	RB	_	31	advmod	_	_
31	bad	bad	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	parataxis	_	_
32	as	as	ADP	IN	_	35	case	_	_
33	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	35	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	33	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	ache	ache	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	31	obl	_	_
36	in	in	ADP	IN	_	38	case	_	_
37	human	human	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	38	amod	_	_
38	beings	being	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	35	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
39	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **is a** | past | wood | a bad guess |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **ache** | past | the fir tree |  |  | sheer longing |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** | present | bark ache in trees |  |  |  |  | as head ache in human beings; bad *property* | tree rules |

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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 Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 5615 (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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