---
title: By-and-by there was a sound of people coming through the courtyard,… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: By-and-by there was a sound of people coming through the courtyard, and the measured tramp of soldiers. Who acts: people. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Hassebu, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of Hassebu, sentence 45

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By-and-by there was a sound of people coming through the courtyard, and the measured tramp of soldiers.

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**Who acts:** people · **What happens:** be, come, measure · **To what, where:** sound, courtyard

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Hassebu. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (people), 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:pg641:30:45
# text = By-and-by there was a sound of people coming through the courtyard, and the measured tramp of soldiers.
1	By	by	ADP	IN	_	2	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	by	by	SCONJ	IN	_	7	mark	_	_
6	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	7	expl	_	_
7	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	sound	sound	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nmod	_	_
12	coming	come	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	11	acl	_	_
13	through	through	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	courtyard	courtyard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	measured	measure	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	20	amod	_	_
20	tramp	tramp	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	conj	_	_
21	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	soldiers	soldier	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past |  | a sound and the measured tramp of soldiers |  |  |  | of people | tree rules |
| 2 | **come** | gerund | people *not said here* |  |  | the courtyard |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme through courtyard=Initial\_Location |
| 3 | **measure** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn register-54.1-2-1 «NP V NP.value»: agent=Theme |

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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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