---
title: His master saw there was something on his mind, and asked what it was. — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: His master saw there was something on his mind, and asked what it was. Who acts: master, something, mind, man. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Goat’s Ears of the Emperor Trojan, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Goat’s Ears of the Emperor Trojan, sentence 13

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His master saw there was something on his mind, and asked what it was.

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**Who acts:** master, something, mind, man · **What happens:** see, be, ask, mind · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Goat’s Ears of the Emperor Trojan. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (master, something, mind, man), 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:pg641:6:13
# text = His master saw there was something on his mind, and asked what it was.
1	His	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	2	nmod:poss	_	_
2	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	5	expl	_	_
5	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	ccomp	_	_
6	something	something	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	5	nsubj	_	_
7	on	on	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	mind	mind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
13	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	12	ccomp	_	_
14	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
15	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	cop	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | past | man's master |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 2 | **be** | past | something |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | man's master *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **is a** | past | mind |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **mind** |  | man |  |  |  |  |  | nom mind «cognition transitive»: poss=agent |

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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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