---
title: The prince was greatly surprised, and said, "Why, these birds can ta… — Indian Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The prince was greatly surprised, and said, "Why, these birds can talk!" Who acts: prince, birds. A sentence of «Indian Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Demon With Matted Hair " 196, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Indian Fairy Tales, Demon With Matted Hair " 196, part 1, sentence 42

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The prince was greatly surprised, and said, "Why, these birds can talk!"

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**Who acts:** prince, birds · **What happens:** be, say, talk · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Indian Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Demon With Matted Hair " 196, 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 (prince, birds), 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:pg7128:7:42
# text = The prince was greatly surprised, and said, "Why, these birds can talk!"
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	prince	prince	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	greatly	greatly	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	surprised	surprised	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
10	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	Why	why	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	8	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	these	this	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	14	det	_	_
14	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj	_	_
15	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	talk	talk	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the prince |  |  |  |  | greatly, surprised *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the prince *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **talk** *in a quote* | can | this birds |  |  |  |  |  | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=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:** «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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