---
title: ‘They used to say I was a pretty little fellow; then I lay in a velv… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘They used to say I was a pretty little fellow; then I lay in a velvet-covered chair in my master’s house. Who acts: people, I. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 5, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 5, sentence 127

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‘They used to say I was a pretty little fellow; then I lay in a velvet-covered chair in my master’s house.

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**Who acts:** people, I · **What happens:** use, say, be, lay, cover · **To what, where:** pretty little fellow, covered chair · **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 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (people, 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:pg5615:5:127
# text = ‘They used to say I was a pretty little fellow; then I lay in a velvet-covered chair in my master’s house.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	used	use	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	say	say	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
7	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
9	pretty	pretty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
10	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	fellow	fellow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	15	punct	_	_
13	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	15	advmod	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	lay	lay	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
18	velvet	velvet	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	covered	cover	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	21	amod	_	_
21	chair	chair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
22	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
23	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	24	nmod:poss	_	_
24	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	’s	's	PART	POS	_	24	case	_	_
26	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **use** | past | people |  |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | to-infinitive | people *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is a** | past | I | a pretty little fellow |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **lay** | present | I |  |  | a covered chair | then | in my master's house | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent in chair=Destination |
| 5 | **cover** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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 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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