---
title: ‘You old wretch! tell me what you have done with my brother, or I wi… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘You old wretch! tell me what you have done with my brother, or I will cut your head off this very instant.’ Who acts: You, old wretch, I. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 23, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 23, sentence 87

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‘You old wretch! tell me what you have done with my brother, or I will cut your head off this very instant.’

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**Who acts:** You, old wretch, I · **What happens:** wretch, tell, do, cut · **To what, where:** me, head · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 23. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (You, old wretch, I), 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:pg5615:23:87
# text = ‘You old wretch! tell me what you have done with my brother, or I will cut your head off this very instant.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	You	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	wretch	wretch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
6	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
7	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	iobj	_	_
8	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	11	obj	_	_
9	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	6	ccomp	_	_
12	with	with	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	brother	brother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
17	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
18	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
19	cut	cut	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	advcl	_	_
20	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	21	nmod:poss	_	_
21	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	_
22	off	off	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	19	obl	_	_
24	very	very	ADV	RB	_	25	advmod	_	_
25	instant	instant	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **wretch** |  | You |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | infinitive | old wretch |  | me |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP what S»: agent=Agent i=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **do** | present · perfect | you |  |  |  |  | with my brother | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Eventuality |
| 4 | **cut** | future | I | your head |  |  |  | off this | vn split-23.2 «NP V NP PP.co-patient»: agent=Agent head=Patient off this=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 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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