---
title: When the old woman saw that the powers of her magic were of so littl… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When the old woman saw that the powers of her magic were of so little avail, she had recourse to cunning. Who acts: old woman, powers, woman. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), part 5, 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/pg640/26/7/)

<!-- 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 Glass Mountain(16), part 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/26/) / 7

# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Glass Mountain(16), part 5, sentence 7

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
When the old woman saw that the powers of her magic were of so little avail, she had recourse to cunning.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** old woman, powers, woman · **What happens:** see, be, have · **To what, where:** recourse · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), part 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (old woman, powers, woman), 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:pg640:26:7
# text = When the old woman saw that the powers of her magic were of so little avail, she had recourse to cunning.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	5	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	advcl	_	_
6	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	powers	power	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	magic	magic	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	_
12	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	cop	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	so	so	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	avail	avail	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
18	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
20	recourse	recourse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	_
21	to	to	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	cunning	cunning	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	19	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | past | the old woman |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 2 | **is** | past | the powers of woman's magic |  |  |  |  | of little avail | tree rules |
| 3 | **have** | past | woman | recourse |  |  |  | to cunning | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent recourse=Patient |

<!-- .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 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/26/6/)
- next →: [sentence 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/26/8/)
- ↑ back to [The Glass Mountain(16), part 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/26/)