---
title: You can believe every word I say,’ said the crow, ‘I have a tame swe… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: You can believe every word I say,’ said the crow, ‘I have a tame sweetheart in the palace, and she tells me everything.’ Who acts: You, I, princess. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 9, 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/pg5615/9/69/)

<!-- 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 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/) / 69

# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 9, sentence 69

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
You can believe every word I say,’ said the crow, ‘I have a tame sweetheart in the palace, and she tells me everything.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** You, I, princess · **What happens:** believe, say, have, tell · **To what, where:** word, crow, tame sweetheart, palace, everything, me · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (You, I, princess), 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:pg5615:9:69
# text = You can believe every word I say,’ said the crow, ‘I have a tame sweetheart in the palace, and she tells me everything.’
1	You	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	believe	believe	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
4	every	every	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	5	det	_	_
5	word	word	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	say	say	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	10	punct	_	_
10	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	crow	crow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
14	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	have	have	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	ccomp	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	tame	tame	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	sweetheart	sweetheart	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	_
20	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	palace	palace	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
25	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
26	tells	tell	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
27	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	26	iobj	_	_
28	everything	everything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Tot	26	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **believe** | can | You | every word |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer word=Stimulus |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | I | every word *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent word=Topic |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the crow |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **have** | present | I | a tame sweetheart |  | the palace |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sweetheart=Patient |
| 5 | **tell** *speech: assert* | present | princess | everything | me |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent i=Recipient everything=Topic |

<!-- .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 68](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/68/)
- next →: [sentence 70](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/70/)
- ↑ back to [The Pink Fairy Book, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/)