---
title: All were dressed in their best clothes and everyone looked toward th… — The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient · tree and pragmatics
description: All were dressed in their best clothes and everyone looked toward the little bird, whom the Emperor requested to commence singing. Who acts: everyone, Emperor. A sentence of «The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient» by Penrhyn Wingfield Coussens, Opening, part 1, with its dependency tree and th
---

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# The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient, Opening, part 1, sentence 155

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All were dressed in their best clothes and everyone looked toward the little bird, whom the Emperor requested to commence singing.

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**Who acts:** everyone, Emperor · **What happens:** dress, look, request, commence, sing · **To what, where:** All, best clothes, little bird

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This is a sentence of «The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient» by Penrhyn Wingfield Coussens, Opening, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (everyone, Emperor), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg65965:1:163
# text = All were dressed in their best clothes and everyone looked toward the little bird, whom the Emperor requested to commence singing.
1	All	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	3	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux:pass	_	_
3	dressed	dress	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	in	in	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
5	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
6	best	good	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	7	amod	_	_
7	clothes	clothes	NOUN	NNS	Number=Ptan	3	obl	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
9	everyone	everyone	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Tot	10	nsubj	_	_
10	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
11	toward	toward	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	whom	whom	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	19	obj	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	Emperor	Emperor	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	_
19	requested	request	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	conj	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	commence	commence	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	xcomp	_	_
22	singing	sing	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	21	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **dress** | past · passive |  | All |  | BIRDS's best clothes |  |  | vn dress-41.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient |
| 2 | **look** | past | everyone |  |  |  |  | toward the little bird | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent toward bird=Theme |
| 3 | **request** | past | the Emperor | the little bird |  |  |  |  | vn beg-58.2 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent whom=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 4 | **commence** | to-infinitive | the Emperor *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 5 | **sing** *speech: express* | gerund | the Emperor *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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.

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**Text:** «The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient» by Penrhyn Wingfield Coussens, Project Gutenberg book 65965 (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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