---
title: Below the floor there was a staircase, which he went down till he re… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Below the floor there was a staircase, which he went down till he reached a door at the foot. Who acts: staircase, king. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 24, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/24/89/)

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 24, sentence 89

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Below the floor there was a staircase, which he went down till he reached a door at the foot.

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**Who acts:** staircase, king · **What happens:** be, go down, reach · **To what, where:** staircase, floor, door, foot

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This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 24. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (staircase, king), 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:pg5615:24:89
# text = Below the floor there was a staircase, which he went down till he reached a door at the foot.
1	Below	below	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	floor	floor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
4	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	5	expl	_	_
5	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	staircase	staircase	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	11	nsubj	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	acl:relcl	_	_
12	down	down	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
13	till	till	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	reached	reach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	door	door	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
18	at	at	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	foot	foot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past |  | a staircase |  | the floor |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **go down** | past | a staircase |  |  |  |  | down *property* | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute |
| 3 | **reach** | past | king | a door |  | the foot |  |  | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP PP.source NP.asset»: agent=Agent door=Theme at foot=Asset |

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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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