---
title: ‘I have served you all these years and you never gave me so much as… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘I have served you all these years and you never gave me so much as a hard crust, but the dear children gave me their own loaf of bread.’ Who acts: I, you, dear children. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Witch (28), with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Witch (28), sentence 66

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘I have served you all these years and you never gave me so much as a hard crust, but the dear children gave me their own loaf of bread.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** I, you, dear children · **What happens:** serve, not give, give · **To what, where:** you, me, own loaf

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Witch (28). The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, you, dear children), 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:pg640:39:66
# text = ‘I have served you all these years and you never gave me so much as a hard crust, but the dear children gave me their own loaf of bread.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	served	serve	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	8	det:predet	_	_
7	these	this	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	8	det	_	_
8	years	year	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl:unmarked	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
10	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
11	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	12	advmod	_	_
12	gave	give	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
13	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	12	iobj	_	_
14	so	so	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	much	much	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
16	as	as	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	hard	hard	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	crust	crust	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
21	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
23	dear	dear	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	amod	_	_
24	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nsubj	_	_
25	gave	give	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
26	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	25	iobj	_	_
27	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	29	nmod:poss	_	_
28	own	own	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	29	amod	_	_
29	loaf	loaf	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	_
30	of	of	ADP	IN	_	31	case	_	_
31	bread	bread	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **serve** | present · perfect | I | you |  |  | year |  | vn masquerade-29.6-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent you=Attribute |
| 2 | **not** **give** | past | you |  | me |  |  | as a hard crust | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Theme |
| 3 | **give** | past | the dear children | children's own loaf of bread | me |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent i=Recipient loaf=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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