---
title: The Prince answered at random, and presently asked if he was not to… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The Prince answered at random, and presently asked if he was not to have the pleasure of seeing the Princess Fiordelisa. Who acts: Prince, pleasure. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Blue Bird, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/2/67/)

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Blue Bird, part 1, sentence 67

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The Prince answered at random, and presently asked if he was not to have the pleasure of seeing the Princess Fiordelisa.

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**Who acts:** Prince, pleasure · **What happens:** answer, ask, not have, see · **To what, where:** random, pleasure, Princess Fiordelisa

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Blue Bird, 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, pleasure), 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:pg7277:2:67
# text = The Prince answered at random, and presently asked if he was not to have the pleasure of seeing the Princess Fiordelisa.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	Prince	Prince	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	at	at	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	random	random	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
8	presently	presently	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
9	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
10	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
11	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
12	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
13	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	15	advmod	_	_
14	to	to	PART	TO	_	15	mark	_	_
15	have	have	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	pleasure	pleasure	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
18	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	19	mark	_	_
19	seeing	see	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	17	acl	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
21	Princess	Princess	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	22	compound	_	_
22	Fiordelisa	Fiordelisa	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	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 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past | the Prince |  |  | random |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | the Prince *not said here* |  |  |  |  | presently *property* | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **not** **have** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | Prince | the pleasure |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent pleasure=Patient |
| 4 | **see** | gerund | the pleasure *not said here* | the Princess Fiordelisa |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer fiordelisa=Stimulus |

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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 Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 7277 (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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