---
title: On the threshold he was greeted by a servant with the news that his… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: On the threshold he was greeted by a servant with the news that his wife had just given birth to a boy. Who acts: servant, boy. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, How Six Men Travelled Through the Wide World, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, How Six Men Travelled Through the Wide World, part 2, sentence 83

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
On the threshold he was greeted by a servant with the news that his wife had just given birth to a boy.

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**Who acts:** servant, boy · **What happens:** greet, give · **To what, where:** miller, threshold, wife

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, How Six Men Travelled Through the Wide World, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (servant, boy), 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:pg640:20:83
# text = On the threshold he was greeted by a servant with the news that his wife had just given birth to a boy.
1	On	on	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	threshold	threshold	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj:pass	_	_
5	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux:pass	_	_
6	greeted	greet	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
7	by	by	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	servant	servant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
10	with	with	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	news	news	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
13	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
14	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj:pass	_	_
16	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
17	just	just	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
18	given	give	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	12	advcl	_	_
19	birth	birth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	_
20	to	to	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl:agent	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **greet** *speech: greet* | past · passive | a servant | miller |  | the threshold |  | with the news | vn judgment-33.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent subject=Theme |
| 2 | **give** | past · perfect · passive | a boy | miller's wife |  |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent subject=Recipient birth=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 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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