---
title: So the King himself stepped down amongst them, and instantly the duc… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: So the King himself stepped down amongst them, and instantly the duck fluttered down into his hands. Who acts: King, duck. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The White Duck, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The White Duck, sentence 65

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So the King himself stepped down amongst them, and instantly the duck fluttered down into his hands.

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**Who acts:** King, duck · **What happens:** step down, flutter down · **To what, where:** hands

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The White Duck. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (King, duck), 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:pg640:29:65
# text = So the King himself stepped down amongst them, and instantly the duck fluttered down into his hands.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	3	nmod	_	_
5	stepped	step	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	down	down	ADP	RP	_	5	compound:prt	_	_
7	amongst	amongst	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
11	instantly	instantly	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	duck	duck	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
14	fluttered	flutter	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
15	down	down	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
16	into	into	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	hands	hand	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **step down** | past | the King  King |  |  |  |  | amongst words *= word* | vn resign-10.11 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **flutter down** | past | the duck |  |  | King's hands |  | down, instantly *property* | vn modes\_of\_being\_with\_motion-47.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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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