---
title: ‘Perhaps,’ thought he, ‘these pretty little plums may help me to rec… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Perhaps,’ thought he, ‘these pretty little plums may help me to recover my purse, my cloak, and my heart from the hands of this wicked Princess. Who acts: little plums, me. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Little Soldier, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every 
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Little Soldier, sentence 259

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‘Perhaps,’ thought he, ‘these pretty little plums may help me to recover my purse, my cloak, and my heart from the hands of this wicked Princess.

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**Who acts:** little plums, me · **What happens:** think, help, recover · **To what, where:** soldier, me, purse · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Little Soldier. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (little plums, me), 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:pg7277:22:259
# text = ‘Perhaps,’ thought he, ‘these pretty little plums may help me to recover my purse, my cloak, and my heart from the hands of this wicked Princess.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Perhaps	perhaps	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
5	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
8	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	these	this	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	12	det	_	_
10	pretty	pretty	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
12	plums	plum	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	nsubj	_	_
13	may	may	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
14	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	ccomp	_	_
15	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	_
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	recover	recover	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	xcomp	_	_
18	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	purse	purse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
21	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	22	nmod:poss	_	_
22	cloak	cloak	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
25	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	heart	heart	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
27	from	from	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	hands	hand	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	26	nmod	_	_
30	of	of	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
31	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	33	det	_	_
32	wicked	wicked	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	33	amod	_	_
33	Princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **think** *speech: other* | past |  | soldier |  |  |  | my heart from the hands of this wicked Princess *obl*; perhaps *property* | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Agent he=Attribute clause=Theme |
| 2 | **help** | may | this little plums | me |  |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent i=Beneficiary clause=Theme |
| 3 | **recover** | to-infinitive | me *not said here* | my purse and my cloak |  |  |  |  | vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent purse=Theme |

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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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