---
title: He made careful inquiries into the matter, and thought it hardly pro… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He made careful inquiries into the matter, and thought it hardly probable that a quiet widow and a young girl would think of attempting anything of the nature of a revolution. Who acts: King, quiet widow. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), part 2, with its 
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Glass Mountain(16), part 2, sentence 29

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He made careful inquiries into the matter, and thought it hardly probable that a quiet widow and a young girl would think of attempting anything of the nature of a revolution.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** King, quiet widow · **What happens:** make, think, attempt · **To what, where:** careful inquiries, matter, anything · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), 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 (King, quiet widow), 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:pg640:23:29
# text = He made careful inquiries into the matter, and thought it hardly probable that a quiet widow and a young girl would think of attempting anything of the nature of a revolution.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	made	make	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	careful	careful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	inquiries	inquiry	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	obj	_	_
5	into	into	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	matter	matter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
11	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	obj	_	_
12	hardly	hardly	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	_
13	probable	probable	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	xcomp	_	_
14	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	23	mark	_	_
15	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
16	quiet	quiet	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	widow	widow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nsubj	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
19	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
20	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	_
21	girl	girl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	conj	_	_
22	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	23	aux	_	_
23	think	think	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	ccomp	_	_
24	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	25	mark	_	_
25	attempting	attempt	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	23	advcl	_	_
26	anything	anything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	25	obj	_	_
27	of	of	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	nature	nature	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	nmod	_	_
30	of	of	ADP	IN	_	32	case	_	_
31	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	32	det	_	_
32	revolution	revolution	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **make** | past | King | careful inquiries |  | the matter |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP.material PP.product»: agent=Agent inquiry=Material into matter=Product |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past | King *not said here* | matter |  |  |  | probable *property* | vn wish-62 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot it=Theme |
| 3 | **think** *speech: other* | would | a quiet widow and a young girl |  |  |  |  |  | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **attempt** | gerund | a quiet widow and a young girl *not said here* | anything |  |  |  |  | vn try-61.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent anything=Eventuality |

<!-- .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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