---
title: But the boy replied, “That is easy enough: I can guess this riddle.” — Russian Folk-Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: But the boy replied, “That is easy enough: I can guess this riddle.” Who acts: boy, That. A sentence of «Russian Folk-Tales» by A. N. Afanas'ev, Opening, part 6, 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/pg62509/6/61/)

<!-- 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/) / [Russian Folk-Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg62509/) / [Opening, part 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg62509/6/) / 61

# Russian Folk-Tales, Opening, part 6, sentence 61

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But the boy replied, “That is easy enough: I can guess this riddle.”

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** boy, That · **What happens:** reply, be, guess · **To what, where:** riddle · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Russian Folk-Tales» by A. N. Afanas'ev, Opening, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (boy, That), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg62509:6:61
# text = But the boy replied, “That is easy enough: I can guess this riddle.”
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
6	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	That	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	9	nsubj	_	_
8	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
9	easy	easy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	ccomp	_	_
10	enough	enough	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
13	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
14	guess	guess	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	parataxis	_	_
15	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	16	det	_	_
16	riddle	riddle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	14	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | the boy |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V S-Quote»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **is** *in a quote* | present | That |  |  |  |  | easy, enough *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **guess** *in a quote* | can | the boy *= boy* | this riddle |  |  |  |  | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent riddle=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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Russian Folk-Tales» by A. N. Afanas'ev, Project Gutenberg book 62509 (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 60](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg62509/6/60/)
- next →: [sentence 62](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg62509/6/62/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg62509/6/)