---
title: He laid hold of his sword, and when the snakes reached his bed he st… — Indian Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: He laid hold of his sword, and when the snakes reached his bed he struck at them and killed them. Who acts: prince, snakes. A sentence of «Indian Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Demon With Matted Hair " 196, part 12, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Indian Fairy Tales, Demon With Matted Hair " 196, part 12, sentence 50

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He laid hold of his sword, and when the snakes reached his bed he struck at them and killed them.

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**Who acts:** prince, snakes · **What happens:** lay, reach, strike, kill, hold · **To what, where:** hold, bed, snakes, sword

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This is a sentence of «Indian Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Demon With Matted Hair " 196, part 12. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (prince, snakes), 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:pg7128:18:50
# text = He laid hold of his sword, and when the snakes reached his bed he struck at them and killed them.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	laid	lay	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	hold	hold	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	sword	sword	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
9	when	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	12	mark	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	snakes	snake	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	nsubj	_	_
12	reached	reach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	advcl	_	_
13	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	bed	bed	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	struck	strike	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
17	at	at	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obl	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	killed	kill	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	conj	_	_
21	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **lay** | past | prince | hold of prince's sword |  |  |  |  | vn create-26.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent hold=Result |
| 2 | **reach** | past | the snakes | prince's bed |  |  |  |  | vn body\_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent bed=Theme |
| 3 | **strike** | past | prince |  |  |  |  | at snakes *= snake* | vn hit-18.1-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent at they=Patient |
| 4 | **kill** | past | prince *not said here* | snakes *= snake* |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |
| 5 | **hold** |  |  | prince's sword |  |  |  |  | nom hold «act transitive»: of=patient |

<!-- .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:** «Indian Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7128 (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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