---
title: It was a long, long way, but when they came to the end they found th… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: It was a long, long way, but when they came to the end they found the dragon’s mother, who was as old as time itself, expecting them. Who acts: road, words, mother. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Stan Bolovan, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/13/80/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Violet Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/) / [Stan Bolovan](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/13/) / 80

# The Violet Fairy Book, Stan Bolovan, sentence 80

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
It was a long, long way, but when they came to the end they found the dragon’s mother, who was as old as time itself, expecting them.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** road, words, mother · **What happens:** be, come, find, expect · **To what, where:** long long way, end, mother, words

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (road, words, mother), 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:pg641:13:80
# text = It was a long, long way, but when they came to the end they found the dragon’s mother, who was as old as time itself, expecting them.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
4	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
9	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
10	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	12	advmod	_	_
11	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	advcl	_	_
13	to	to	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	end	end	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
16	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
17	found	find	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	advcl	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	dragon	dragon	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	’s	's	PART	POS	_	19	case	_	_
21	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
23	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	26	nsubj	_	_
24	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	cop	_	_
25	as	as	ADV	RB	_	26	advmod	_	_
26	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	_
27	as	as	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
28	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	obl	_	_
29	itself	itself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Emp|Reflex=Yes	28	nmod:unmarked	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
31	expecting	expect	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	17	advcl	_	_
32	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	31	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past | road | a long long way |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **come** | past | words *= word* |  |  |  | to the end |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to end=Initial\_Location |
| 3 | **find** | past | words *= word* | the dragon's mother |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mother=Topic |
| 4 | **is** | past | the dragon's mother |  |  |  | time | old *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **expect** | gerund | words *= word* *not said here* | words *= word* |  |  |  |  | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 79](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/13/79/)
- next →: [sentence 81](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/13/81/)
- ↑ back to [Stan Bolovan](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/13/)