---
title: At the gate of the palace his nurse, old Birscha, was waiting for hi… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: At the gate of the palace his nurse, old Birscha, was waiting for him eagerly. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Fairy of the Dawn, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Fairy of the Dawn, part 1, sentence 69

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At the gate of the palace his nurse, old Birscha, was waiting for him eagerly.

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**What happens:** wait · **To what, where:** gate

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Fairy of the Dawn, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg641:19:69
# text = At the gate of the palace his nurse, old Birscha, was waiting for him eagerly.
1	At	at	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	gate	gate	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	palace	palace	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nmod	_	_
7	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	8	nmod:poss	_	_
8	nurse	nurse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
10	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	Birscha	Birscha	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
13	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
14	waiting	wait	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
15	for	for	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obl	_	_
17	eagerly	eagerly	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **wait** | past · progressive |  |  |  | the gate of the palace and help's nurse |  | for help; eagerly *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme at gate=Location |

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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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