---
title: Four legs began to grow on him, a thick head, and two long ears, and… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Four legs began to grow on him, a thick head, and two long ears, and he saw with horror that he had changed into a donkey. Who acts: Four legs, Hunter. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Donkey Cabbage, part 1, 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/pg640/10/70/)

<!-- 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 Yellow Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/) / [The Donkey Cabbage, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/10/) / 70

# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Donkey Cabbage, part 1, sentence 70

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Four legs began to grow on him, a thick head, and two long ears, and he saw with horror that he had changed into a donkey.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Four legs, Hunter · **What happens:** begin, grow, see, change · **To what, where:** thick head · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Donkey Cabbage, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Four legs, Hunter), 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:pg640:10:70
# text = Four legs began to grow on him, a thick head, and two long ears, and he saw with horror that he had changed into a donkey.
1	Four	four	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	2	nummod	_	_
2	legs	leg	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	grow	grow	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	on	on	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	thick	thick	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
14	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	16	nummod	_	_
15	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	ears	ear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
19	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
20	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
21	with	with	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	horror	horror	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
23	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	26	mark	_	_
24	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
25	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	aux	_	_
26	changed	change	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	20	ccomp	_	_
27	into	into	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	donkey	donkey	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **begin** | past | Four legs |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **grow** | to-infinitive | Four legs *not said here* | a thick head |  |  |  | on Hunter | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on he=Location |
| 3 | **see** | past | Hunter |  |  |  |  | with horror | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 4 | **change** | past · perfect | Hunter |  |  |  |  | into a donkey *result* | vn turn-26.6.1-1 «NP.patient V PP.result»: agent=Patient into donkey=Result |

<!-- .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 Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 640 (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 69](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/10/69/)
- next →: [sentence 71](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/10/71/)
- ↑ back to [The Donkey Cabbage, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/10/)