---
title: There was a fierce battle then, and the sea became so stormy that it… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: There was a fierce battle then, and the sea became so stormy that it was not very easy to keep the boat from being filled by the waves. Who acts: fierce battle, sea, waves. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Hermod and Hadvor (32), with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of ev
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, Hermod and Hadvor (32), sentence 89

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
There was a fierce battle then, and the sea became so stormy that it was not very easy to keep the boat from being filled by the waves.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** fierce battle, sea, waves · **What happens:** be, become, not be, keep, fill · **To what, where:** boat

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Hermod and Hadvor (32). The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (fierce battle, sea, waves), 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:pg640:49:89
# text = There was a fierce battle then, and the sea became so stormy that it was not very easy to keep the boat from being filled by the waves.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
4	fierce	fierce	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	battle	battle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
6	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	2	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	sea	sea	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
11	became	become	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
12	so	so	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	_
13	stormy	stormy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	xcomp	_	_
14	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	19	mark	_	_
15	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	expl	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	cop	_	_
17	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	19	advmod	_	_
18	very	very	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
19	easy	easy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	advcl	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	keep	keep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	csubj	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	boat	boat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	_
24	from	from	SCONJ	IN	_	26	mark	_	_
25	being	be	AUX	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	26	aux:pass	_	_
26	filled	fill	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	21	advcl	_	_
27	by	by	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	waves	wave	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	26	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | a fierce battle |  |  | there | then |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **become** | past | the sea |  |  |  |  | stormy *property* | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |
| 3 | **not** **is** | past | the sea *not said here* |  |  |  |  | easy *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **keep** | to-infinitive |  | the boat |  |  |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent boat=Theme |
| 5 | **fill** | gerund · passive | the waves |  |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=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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