---
title: I know neither my country nor my parents, and the only thing I can s… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: I know neither my country nor my parents, and the only thing I can say for certain is that I am called Serpentine. Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Donkey Cabbage, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Donkey Cabbage, part 3, sentence 29

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I know neither my country nor my parents, and the only thing I can say for certain is that I am called Serpentine.

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** know, say, call · **To what, where:** only thing · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Donkey Cabbage, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (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:pg640:12:29
# text = I know neither my country nor my parents, and the only thing I can say for certain is that I am called Serpentine.
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	know	know	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	neither	neither	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
4	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	country	country	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
6	nor	nor	CCONJ	CC	Polarity=Neg	8	cc	_	_
7	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	8	nmod:poss	_	_
8	parents	parent	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	only	only	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nsubj:pass	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
15	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	say	say	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	acl:relcl	_	_
17	for	for	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	certain	certain	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	obl	_	_
19	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	aux:pass	_	_
20	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	23	mark	_	_
21	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
22	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	aux:pass	_	_
23	called	call	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	2	parataxis	_	_
24	Serpentine	Serpentine	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	23	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **know** | present | I |  |  |  |  | neither my country nor my parents | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | can | I | the only thing *not said here* |  |  |  | for certain | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent thing=Topic |
| 3 | **call** | present · passive |  | the only thing |  |  |  |  | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: subject=Recipient |

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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 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.

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