---
title: Seeing a stranger on horseback, he asked what brought him there and… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Seeing a stranger on horseback, he asked what brought him there and where he was going. Who acts: loss. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Blue Mountains, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Blue Mountains, sentence 100

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Seeing a stranger on horseback, he asked what brought him there and where he was going.

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**Who acts:** loss · **What happens:** see, ask, bring, go · **To what, where:** stranger, horseback, loss · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Blue Mountains. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (loss), 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:pg640:45:100
# text = Seeing a stranger on horseback, he asked what brought him there and where he was going.
1	Seeing	see	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	stranger	stranger	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	obj	_	_
4	on	on	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	horseback	horseback	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
7	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	10	nsubj	_	_
10	brought	bring	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	ccomp	_	_
11	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	obj	_	_
12	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	10	advmod	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
14	where	where	ADV	WRB	PronType=Rel	17	advmod	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
17	going	go	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	10	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | gerund | loss *not said here* | a stranger |  | horseback |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer stranger=Stimulus |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | loss |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **bring** | past |  |  | loss | there |  |  | vn bring-11.3-1 «NP V NP ADVP»: agent=Instrument he=Destination |
| 4 | **go** | past · progressive | loss |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «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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