---
title: He was very much frightened, but, luckily, instead of throwing the b… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He was very much frightened, but, luckily, instead of throwing the box away, he only shut it tight, and put it in his pocket. Who acts: man. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Snuff-box, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/20/4/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Green Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/) / [The Snuff-box](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/20/) / 4

# The Green Fairy Book, The Snuff-box, sentence 4

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He was very much frightened, but, luckily, instead of throwing the box away, he only shut it tight, and put it in his pocket.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** man · **What happens:** frighten, throw away, shut, put · **To what, where:** man, box, language, pocket

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Snuff-box. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg7277:20:4
# text = He was very much frightened, but, luckily, instead of throwing the box away, he only shut it tight, and put it in his pocket.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux:pass	_	_
3	very	very	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	much	much	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	frightened	frighten	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
9	luckily	luckily	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
11	instead	instead	ADV	RB	ExtPos=SCONJ	13	mark	_	_
12	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	fixed	_	_
13	throwing	throw	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	5	advcl	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	box	box	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	_
16	away	away	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
18	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
19	only	only	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
20	shut	shut	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	conj	_	_
21	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	_
22	tight	tight	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
25	put	put	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	_
26	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	obj	_	_
27	in	in	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	29	nmod:poss	_	_
29	pocket	pocket	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **frighten** | past · passive |  | man |  |  |  | luckily *property* | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: subject=Experiencer |
| 2 | **throw away** | gerund |  | the box |  |  |  | away *property* | vn throw-17.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent box=Theme |
| 3 | **shut** | past | man | language |  |  |  | tight *property* | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent it=Patient |
| 4 | **put** | infinitive |  | language |  | man's pocket |  |  | vn put-9.1-2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent it=Theme in pocket=Destination |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/20/3/)
- next →: [sentence 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/20/5/)
- ↑ back to [The Snuff-box](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/20/)