---
title: I had better take it myself to some great rich man, and see what it… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: I had better take it myself to some great rich man, and see what it will do for me.’ Who acts: I, grass. 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 40

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I had better take it myself to some great rich man, and see what it will do for me.’

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**Who acts:** I, grass · **What happens:** have, take, see, do · **To what, where:** grass · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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, grass), 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:pg641:15:40
# text = I had better take it myself to some great rich man, and see what it will do for me.’
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	2	xcomp	_	_
4	take	take	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	xcomp	_	_
5	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	myself	myself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	4	obj	_	_
7	to	to	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
8	some	some	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	11	det	_	_
9	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
10	rich	rich	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	_
15	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	18	obj	_	_
16	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
17	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
18	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	ccomp	_	_
19	for	for	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | I |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **take** | infinitive | I *not said here* | grass |  |  |  | to some great rich man | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP ADVP»: agent=Instrument it=Theme myself=Destination |
| 3 | **see** | infinitive | I *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 4 | **do** | future | grass |  |  |  |  | for me | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Eventuality |

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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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