---
title: ‘Why, there is nothing very odd in taking a mouthful of water!’ repl… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Why, there is nothing very odd in taking a mouthful of water!’ replied the man, standing up. Who acts: nothing. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 19, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/19/76/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Pink Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/) / [The Pink Fairy Book, part 19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/19/) / 76

# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 19, sentence 76

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘Why, there is nothing very odd in taking a mouthful of water!’ replied the man, standing up.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** nothing · **What happens:** be, take, reply, stand up · **To what, where:** mouthful, man · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 19. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nothing), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg5615:19:76
# text = ‘Why, there is nothing very odd in taking a mouthful of water!’ replied the man, standing up.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Why	why	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	17	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
4	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	5	expl	_	_
5	is	be	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	17	ccomp	_	_
6	nothing	nothing	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	5	nsubj	_	_
7	very	very	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
8	odd	odd	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
9	in	in	SCONJ	IN	_	10	mark	_	_
10	taking	take	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	_
11	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	mouthful	mouthful	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
17	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
21	standing	stand	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	17	advcl	_	_
22	up	up	ADP	RP	_	21	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	17	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | present | nothing |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **take** | gerund | nothing *not said here* | a mouthful of water |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mouthful=Theme |
| 3 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past |  | the man |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **stand up** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 75](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/19/75/)
- next →: [sentence 77](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/19/77/)
- ↑ back to [The Pink Fairy Book, part 19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/19/)