---
title: He asked her in all the languages he knew, but she remained as dumb… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He asked her in all the languages he knew, but she remained as dumb as a fish. Who acts: king, maiden. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Six Swans, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Six Swans, sentence 62

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He asked her in all the languages he knew, but she remained as dumb as a fish.

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**Who acts:** king, maiden · **What happens:** ask, know, remain · **To what, where:** maiden, languages

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Six Swans. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (king, maiden), 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:pg640:4:62
# text = He asked her in all the languages he knew, but she remained as dumb as a fish.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	iobj	_	_
4	in	in	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
5	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	7	det:predet	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	languages	language	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	obl	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
11	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
12	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	remained	remain	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
14	as	as	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	dumb	dumb	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	xcomp	_	_
16	as	as	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	fish	fish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | king |  | maiden | all languages |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent she=Recipient |
| 2 | **know** | past | king | all languages *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer language=Stimulus |
| 3 | **remain** | past | maiden |  |  |  |  | dumb *property* | vn exist-47.1 «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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