---
title: Then said the first soldier, ‘In the North Sea lies a dead sea-cat;… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Then said the first soldier, ‘In the North Sea lies a dead sea-cat; that shall be the roast meat.’ Who acts: dead sea cat, that. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Dragon and His Grandmother, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/9/62/)

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Dragon and His Grandmother, sentence 62

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Then said the first soldier, ‘In the North Sea lies a dead sea-cat; that shall be the roast meat.’

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**Who acts:** dead sea cat, that · **What happens:** say, lie, be · **To what, where:** first soldier, North Sea, roast meat · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Dragon and His Grandmother. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (dead sea cat, that), 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:pg640:9:62
# text = Then said the first soldier, ‘In the North Sea lies a dead sea-cat; that shall be the roast meat.’
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	2	advmod	_	_
2	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
4	first	first	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	5	amod	_	_
5	soldier	soldier	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
7	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	In	in	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	North	North	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	compound	_	_
11	Sea	Sea	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
12	lies	lie	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
14	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
15	sea	sea	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	24	punct	_	_
19	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	24	nsubj	_	_
20	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
21	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	24	cop	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
23	roast	roast	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	compound	_	_
24	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	24	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	24	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the first soldier |  |  | then |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent soldier=Topic |
| 2 | **lie** | present | a dead sea cat |  |  | the North Sea |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent in sea=Location |
| 3 | **is a** | shall | that | the roast meat |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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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