---
title: In vain the master prayed and threatened, and promised Hans a large… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: In vain the master prayed and threatened, and promised Hans a large reward if he would only drive him on. Who acts: master. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Headless Dwarfs, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Headless Dwarfs, sentence 77

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In vain the master prayed and threatened, and promised Hans a large reward if he would only drive him on.

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**Who acts:** master · **What happens:** pray, threaten, promise, drive on · **To what, where:** vain, large reward, Hans

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Headless Dwarfs. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (master), 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:pg641:33:77
# text = In vain the master prayed and threatened, and promised Hans a large reward if he would only drive him on.
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	2	case	_	_
2	vain	vain	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	obl	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	prayed	pray	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
7	threatened	threaten	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	promised	promise	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
11	Hans	Han	PROPN	NNPS	Number=Plur	10	obj	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	large	large	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	reward	reward	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
15	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	19	mark	_	_
16	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
17	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	only	only	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
19	drive	drive	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	advcl	_	_
20	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	_
21	on	on	ADP	RP	_	19	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **pray** | past | the master |  |  | vain |  |  | vn long-32.2 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |
| 2 | **threaten** | past | the master *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **promise** *speech: promise* | past | the master *not said here* | a large reward | Hans |  |  |  | vn future\_having-13.3 «NP V NP.goal NP»: agent=Agent han=Goal reward=Theme |
| 4 | **drive on** *a condition, not said to happen* | would | master | Hans |  |  |  |  | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=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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