---
title: When the mistress read it she could hardly believe her eyes and call… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When the mistress read it she could hardly believe her eyes and called for her daughter. Who acts: mistress. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Three Wonderful Beggars, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of Three Wonderful Beggars, sentence 65

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When the mistress read it she could hardly believe her eyes and called for her daughter.

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**Who acts:** mistress · **What happens:** read, believe, call · **To what, where:** letter, eyes · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Three Wonderful Beggars. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (mistress), 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:pg641:4:65
# text = When the mistress read it she could hardly believe her eyes and called for her daughter.
1	When	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	4	mark	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	mistress	mistress	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	read	read	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	advcl	_	_
5	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
7	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
8	hardly	hardly	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
9	believe	believe	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	ccomp	_	_
10	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obj	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	called	call	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
14	for	for	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
16	daughter	daughter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	13	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **read** | past | the mistress | letter |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **believe** | could | mistress | mistress's eyes |  |  |  | hardly *property* | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer eye=Stimulus |
| 3 | **call** | past |  |  |  |  |  | for mistress's daughter | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V PP.recipient S\_INF»: agent=Agent for daughter=Recipient |

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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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