---
title: So he took out the snuff-box and opened it, and again it asked ‘What… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: So he took out the snuff-box and opened it, and again it asked ‘What do you want?’ Who acts: man, pocket, you. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Snuff-box, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Snuff-box, sentence 7

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So he took out the snuff-box and opened it, and again it asked ‘What do you want?’

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**Who acts:** man, pocket, you · **What happens:** take out, open, ask, want · **To what, where:** snuff box, pocket · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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, pocket, you), 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:pg7277:20:7
# text = So he took out the snuff-box and opened it, and again it asked ‘What do you want?’
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	out	out	ADP	RP	_	3	compound:prt	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
6	snuff	snuff	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	box	box	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	opened	open	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
11	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
14	again	again	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	_
15	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
17	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	21	obj	_	_
19	do	do	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
20	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
21	want	want	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	21	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take out** | past | man | the snuff box |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent box=Theme |
| 2 | **open** | past | man *not said here* | pocket |  |  |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location it=Theme |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | pocket |  |  |  | again |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **want** | present · do-support | you |  |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot what=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 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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