---
title: At first they heaved with a will, but when the stone was half way up… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: At first they heaved with a will, but when the stone was half way up they let it drop suddenly, and it fell to the bottom broken into a hundred pieces. Who acts: ropes, stone. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragm
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Glass Mountain(16), part 3, sentence 77

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
At first they heaved with a will, but when the stone was half way up they let it drop suddenly, and it fell to the bottom broken into a hundred pieces.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** ropes, stone · **What happens:** heave, be, let, drop, fall, break · **To what, where:** way, stone, bottom, hundred pieces

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), 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 (ropes, stone), 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:pg640:24:77
# text = At first they heaved with a will, but when the stone was half way up they let it drop suddenly, and it fell to the bottom broken into a hundred pieces.
1	At	at	ADP	IN	_	2	case	_	_
2	first	first	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	4	obl	_	_
3	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	heaved	heave	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	with	with	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
9	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
10	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	stone	stone	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
13	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	cop	_	_
14	half	half	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Frac	15	advmod	_	_
15	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	parataxis	_	_
16	up	up	ADP	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
17	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	let	let	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	15	advcl	_	_
19	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	obj	_	_
20	drop	drop	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	xcomp	_	_
21	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
24	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	nsubj	_	_
25	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
26	to	to	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
27	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	bottom	bottom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	_
29	broken	break	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	28	acl	_	_
30	into	into	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
31	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	32	det	_	_
32	hundred	hundred	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	33	nummod	_	_
33	pieces	piece	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	29	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **heave** | past | ropes *= rope* |  |  |  |  |  | vn push-12 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **is a** | past | the stone | way |  |  |  | half *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **let** | present | ropes *= rope* | stone |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **drop** | infinitive | stone *not said here* |  |  |  |  | suddenly *property* | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP.theme V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **fall** | past | stone |  |  |  |  | to the bottom | vn acquiesce-95.1-1 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent to bottom=Theme |
| 6 | **break** | participle |  | the bottom *not said here* |  |  |  | into hundred pieces *result* | vn break-45.1 «NP V PP.result»: agent=Patient into piece=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.

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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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