---
title: As he drew near he heard sounds of weeping and lamentations, and he… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: As he drew near he heard sounds of weeping and lamentations, and he said to a man he met: ‘What is the matter?’ Who acts: Halfman. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Halfman, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of Halfman, sentence 136

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As he drew near he heard sounds of weeping and lamentations, and he said to a man he met: ‘What is the matter?’

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**Who acts:** Halfman · **What happens:** draw, hear, say, meet, be · **To what, where:** sounds, man, matter · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Halfman. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Halfman), 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:pg641:41:136
# text = As he drew near he heard sounds of weeping and lamentations, and he said to a man he met: ‘What is the matter?’
1	As	as	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	drew	draw	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	near	near	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
7	sounds	sound	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obj	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	weeping	weeping	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
11	lamentations	lamentation	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
16	to	to	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
19	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
20	met	meet	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	22	punct	_	_
22	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	26	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	26	nsubj	_	_
24	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	26	cop	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	matter	matter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	26	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	26	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **draw** | past | Halfman |  |  |  |  |  | vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **hear** | past | Halfman | sounds of weeping and lamentations |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer sound=Stimulus |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Halfman |  | a man |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to man=Recipient |
| 4 | **meet** | past | Halfman | a man *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent man=Co-Agent |
| 5 | **is a** | present |  | the matter |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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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