---
title: ‘Take one of my scales,’ said the fish, ‘and when you find yourself… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Take one of my scales,’ said the fish, ‘and when you find yourself in danger, throw it in the fire. Who acts: you. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Halfman, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/41/63/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Violet Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/) / [The Story of Halfman](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/41/) / 63

# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of Halfman, sentence 63

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘Take one of my scales,’ said the fish, ‘and when you find yourself in danger, throw it in the fire.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** you · **What happens:** take, say, find, throw · **To what, where:** one, fish, yourself, danger, fire · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (you), 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:pg641:41:63
# text = ‘Take one of my scales,’ said the fish, ‘and when you find yourself in danger, throw it in the fire.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Take	take	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
3	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	2	obj	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	scales	scale	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
9	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	fish	fish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
13	‘	‘	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	22	cc	_	_
15	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	17	advmod	_	_
16	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
17	find	find	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	22	advcl	_	_
18	yourself	yourself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	17	obj	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	danger	danger	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
22	throw	throw	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	conj	_	_
23	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	obj	_	_
24	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take** | infinitive |  | one of my scales |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent one=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the fish and ‘ |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **find** | present | you | yourself |  | danger |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent yourself=Topic |
| 4 | **throw** | infinitive |  | danger |  | the fire |  |  | vn throw-17.1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.destinations»: agent=Agent it=Theme in fire=Destination |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 62](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/41/62/)
- next →: [sentence 64](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/41/64/)
- ↑ back to [The Story of Halfman](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/41/)