---
title: But, tell me, what did you do with the bird, for it was you, and you… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But, tell me, what did you do with the bird, for it was you, and you only who watched for it?’ Who acts: you, fool. 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 146

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But, tell me, what did you do with the bird, for it was you, and you only who watched for it?’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** you, fool · **What happens:** tell, do, be, watch · **To what, where:** me · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (you, fool), 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:pg641:29:146
# text = But, tell me, what did you do with the bird, for it was you, and you only who watched for it?’
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	tell	tell	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	iobj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
6	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	9	obj	_	_
7	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
8	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
10	with	with	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
14	for	for	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
15	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	cop	_	_
17	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	9	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
20	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
21	only	only	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	_
22	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	23	nsubj	_	_
23	watched	watch	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	advcl	_	_
24	for	for	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | imperative | you *not said here* |  | me |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent i=Recipient |
| 2 | **do** | past · do-support | you |  |  |  |  | with the bird | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Eventuality |
| 3 | **is** | past | fool |  |  |  |  | for you | tree rules |
| 4 | **watch** | past | you |  |  |  |  | for fool | vn search-35.2 «NP V PP.theme NP.location»: agent=Agent for it=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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