---
title: Now Jesper had always heard the ants spoken of as clever and industr… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Now Jesper had always heard the ants spoken of as clever and industrious little creatures, while he never heard anyone say a good word for the beetles, so he agreed to give the wished-for help. Who acts: Jesper, anyone. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jesper Who Herded the Hare
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/24/53/)

<!-- 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/) / [Jesper Who Herded the Hares](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/24/) / 53

# The Violet Fairy Book, Jesper Who Herded the Hares, sentence 53

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Now Jesper had always heard the ants spoken of as clever and industrious little creatures, while he never heard anyone say a good word for the beetles, so he agreed to give the wished-for help.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Jesper, anyone · **What happens:** hear, speak, not hear, say, agree, give · **To what, where:** Jesper, ants, good word, wished help · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jesper Who Herded the Hares. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Jesper, anyone), 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:pg641:24:53
# text = Now Jesper had always heard the ants spoken of as clever and industrious little creatures, while he never heard anyone say a good word for the beetles, so he agreed to give the wished-for help.
1	Now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	5	advmod	_	_
2	Jesper	Jesper	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	nsubj:pass	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	5	advmod	_	_
5	heard	hear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	ants	ant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obj	_	_
8	spoken	speak	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	7	acl	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	8	obl	_	_
10	as	as	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
11	clever	clever	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	industrious	industrious	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	conj	_	_
14	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	creatures	creature	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
17	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	20	mark	_	_
18	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
19	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	20	advmod	_	_
20	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	_
21	anyone	anyone	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	22	nsubj	_	_
22	say	say	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	20	ccomp	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
24	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	amod	_	_
25	word	word	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obj	_	_
26	for	for	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
27	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	beetles	beetle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
30	so	so	ADV	RB	_	32	advmod	_	_
31	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	32	nsubj	_	_
32	agreed	agree	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	conj	_	_
33	to	to	PART	TO	_	34	mark	_	_
34	give	give	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	32	xcomp	_	_
35	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	39	det	_	_
36	wished	wish	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	39	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
37	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	36	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
38	for	for	ADP	IN	_	39	case	_	_
39	help	help	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	34	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
40	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hear** | past · perfect · passive |  | Jesper |  |  | now | always *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **speak** *speech: other* | participle |  | the ants *not said here* |  |  |  | as clever little creatures | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **not** **hear** | past | Jesper |  |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | infinitive | anyone | a good word |  |  |  | for the beetles | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent word=Topic |
| 5 | **agree** *speech: agree* | past | Jesper |  |  |  |  |  | vn correspond-36.1-1 «NP V what S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 6 | **give** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | Jesper *not said here* | the wished help |  |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent help=Theme |
| 7 | **wish** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V for NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |

<!-- .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 52](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/24/52/)
- next →: [sentence 54](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/24/54/)
- ↑ back to [Jesper Who Herded the Hares](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/24/)