---
title: ‘If I am to know it, I shall know it,’ replied the gazelle; ‘but tel… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘If I am to know it, I shall know it,’ replied the gazelle; ‘but tell me, who is the lord of this house?’ Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of a Gazelle, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of a Gazelle, sentence 123

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘If I am to know it, I shall know it,’ replied the gazelle; ‘but tell me, who is the lord of this house?’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** know, reply, tell, be · **To what, where:** grandson, gazelle, me, lord · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of a Gazelle. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I), 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:pg641:15:123
# text = ‘If I am to know it, I shall know it,’ replied the gazelle; ‘but tell me, who is the lord of this house?’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
3	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	xcomp	_	_
7	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
9	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	ccomp	_	_
12	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	15	punct	_	_
15	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	gazelle	gazelle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	21	punct	_	_
19	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	parataxis	_	_
22	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	21	iobj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
24	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	27	nsubj	_	_
25	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	27	cop	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	lord	lord	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	_
28	of	of	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	30	det	_	_
30	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	21	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **know** | to-infinitive | I *not said here* | grandson |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer it=Stimulus |
| 2 | **know** | shall | I | grandson |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer it=Stimulus |
| 3 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past |  | the gazelle |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **tell** *speech: assert* | infinitive |  |  | me |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent i=Recipient |
| 5 | **is a** | present |  | the lord |  |  |  | of this house | 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 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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