---
title: They had sailed for several days, when the breeze suddenly fell, and… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: They had sailed for several days, when the breeze suddenly fell, and there came a dead calm, at a time when they needed only one day’s voyage to reach home. Who acts: King, breeze, one day. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Witch in the Stone Boat(31), with its dependency tre
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Witch in the Stone Boat(31), sentence 12

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They had sailed for several days, when the breeze suddenly fell, and there came a dead calm, at a time when they needed only one day’s voyage to reach home.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** King, breeze, one day · **What happens:** sail, fall, come, need, reach, voyage · **To what, where:** voyage

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Witch in the Stone Boat(31). The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (King, breeze, one day), 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:pg640:47:12
# text = They had sailed for several days, when the breeze suddenly fell, and there came a dead calm, at a time when they needed only one day’s voyage to reach home.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	sailed	sail	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
4	for	for	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	several	several	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	days	day	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
8	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	12	advmod	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	breeze	breeze	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
11	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
12	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
15	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	16	expl	_	_
16	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	calm	calm	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	at	at	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	_
24	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	26	advmod	_	_
25	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
26	needed	need	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	acl:relcl	_	_
27	only	only	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
28	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	29	nummod	_	_
29	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	31	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	’s	's	PART	POS	_	29	case	_	_
31	voyage	voyage	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	obj	_	_
32	to	to	PART	TO	_	33	mark	_	_
33	reach	reach	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	26	advcl	_	_
34	home	home	ADV	RB	_	33	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sail** | past · perfect | King |  |  |  | day |  | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2-1 «NP.agent V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **fall** | past | the breeze |  |  |  |  | suddenly *property* | vn occur-48.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **come** | past | the breeze *not said here* |  |  | there | time | calm *property* | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **need** | past | King | one day's voyage |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot voyage=Theme |
| 5 | **reach** | to-infinitive | King *not said here* |  |  |  |  | home *property* | vn body\_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 6 | **voyage** |  | one day |  |  |  |  |  | nom voyage «act transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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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