---
title: ‘Woe be to us, mother,’ said the dragon; ‘this man will soon get us… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Woe be to us, mother,’ said the dragon; ‘this man will soon get us into his power. Who acts: Woe, man. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Stan Bolovan, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, Stan Bolovan, sentence 152

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‘Woe be to us, mother,’ said the dragon; ‘this man will soon get us into his power.

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**Who acts:** Woe, man · **What happens:** be, say, get · **To what, where:** dragon, us, power · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Stan Bolovan. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Woe, man), 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:pg641:13:152
# text = ‘Woe be to us, mother,’ said the dragon; ‘this man will soon get us into his power.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Woe	woe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	_
3	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	cop	_	_
4	to	to	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
7	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
10	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	dragon	dragon	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	19	punct	_	_
14	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	16	det	_	_
16	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	_
17	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	soon	soon	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	19	advmod	_	_
19	get	get	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	conj	_	_
20	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	19	iobj	_	_
21	into	into	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	nmod:poss	_	_
23	power	power	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | infinitive |  |  |  |  |  | to us | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Woe and mother | the dragon |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent dragon=Topic |
| 3 | **get** | future | this man |  | us | man's power |  | soon *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer we=Stimulus |

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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 Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 641 (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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