---
title: ‘I did not eat your dates,’ persisted the bird, ‘and the day is dawn… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘I did not eat your dates,’ persisted the bird, ‘and the day is dawning. Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nunda, Eater of People, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Nunda, Eater of People, sentence 102

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘I did not eat your dates,’ persisted the bird, ‘and the day is dawning.

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** not eat, persist, dawn · **To what, where:** dates, bird

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nunda, Eater of People. 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.

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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:pg641:29:102
# text = ‘I did not eat your dates,’ persisted the bird, ‘and the day is dawning.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	eat	eat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	ccomp	_	_
6	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
7	dates	date	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
10	persisted	persist	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
14	‘	‘	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl:unmarked	_	_
18	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
19	dawning	dawn	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	10	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **eat** | past · do-support | I | your dates |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent date=Patient |
| 2 | **persist** | past |  | the bird and ‘ |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **dawn** | present · progressive |  |  |  |  | day |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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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