---
title: Assistance was out of the question--unless, he suddenly thought--unl… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Assistance was out of the question--unless, he suddenly thought--unless the King of the Ants could help. Who acts: Assistance, King. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jesper Who Herded the Hares, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, Jesper Who Herded the Hares, sentence 85

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Assistance was out of the question--unless, he suddenly thought--unless the King of the Ants could help.

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**Who acts:** Assistance, King · **What happens:** be, think, help · **To what, where:** question

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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 (Assistance, King), 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:pg641:24:85
# text = Assistance was out of the question--unless, he suddenly thought--unless the King of the Ants could help.
1	Assistance	Assistance	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
3	out	out	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	question	question	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	unless	unless	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
11	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
12	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	unless	unless	SCONJ	IN	_	21	mark	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
17	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	Ants	ant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nmod	_	_
20	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | Assistance |  |  | the question |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* *a condition, not said to happen* | past | Assistance |  |  |  |  | suddenly *property* | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 3 | **help** *a condition, not said to happen* | could | the King of the Ants |  |  |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent |

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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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