---
title: ‘I can lie down there,’ thought Little Klaus, looking at the roof; ‘… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘I can lie down there,’ thought Little Klaus, looking at the roof; ‘it will make a splendid bed, if only the stork won’t fly down and bite my legs.’ Who acts: I, roof, stork. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Big Klaus and Little Klaus, with its dependency tree and t
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Story of Big Klaus and Little Klaus, sentence 27

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘I can lie down there,’ thought Little Klaus, looking at the roof; ‘it will make a splendid bed, if only the stork won’t fly down and bite my legs.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** I, roof, stork · **What happens:** lie down, think, look, make, not fly down, bite · **To what, where:** Little, splendid bed, legs · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Big Klaus and Little Klaus. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, roof, stork), 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:pg640:41:27
# text = ‘I can lie down there,’ thought Little Klaus, looking at the roof; ‘it will make a splendid bed, if only the stork won’t fly down and bite my legs.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	lie	lie	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
5	down	down	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
6	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
9	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	Little	Little	ADJ	NNP	Degree=Pos	9	obj	_	_
11	Klaus	Klaus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	flat	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
13	looking	look	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	9	advcl	_	_
14	at	at	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	roof	roof	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
18	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
20	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
22	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
23	splendid	splendid	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	amod	_	_
24	bed	bed	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
26	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	32	mark	_	_
27	only	only	ADV	RB	_	29	advmod	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	stork	stork	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	nsubj	_	_
30	wo	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	32	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	n’t	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	32	advmod	_	_
32	fly	fly	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	conj	_	_
33	down	down	ADP	RP	_	32	compound:prt	_	_
34	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	35	cc	_	_
35	bite	bite	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	32	conj	_	_
36	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	37	nmod:poss	_	_
37	legs	leg	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	35	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
38	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
39	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	21	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **lie down** | can | I |  |  | there |  | down *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past |  | Little |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Agent little=Attribute clause=Theme |
| 3 | **look** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | at the roof | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent at roof=Theme |
| 4 | **make** | future | roof | a splendid bed |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.material V NP»: agent=Material bed=Product |
| 5 | **not** **fly down** *a condition, not said to happen* | future | the stork |  |  |  |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 6 | **bite** | infinitive | the stork *not said here* | my legs |  |  |  |  | vn swat-18.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent leg=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.

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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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