---
title: He sprang out of bed, and, scarcely waiting to dress himself, hasten… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He sprang out of bed, and, scarcely waiting to dress himself, hastened to ask if anyone had been to inquire for him. Who acts: John, anyone. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Little Soldier, 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/pg7277/22/73/)

<!-- 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 Little Soldier](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/22/) / 73

# The Green Fairy Book, The Little Soldier, sentence 73

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He sprang out of bed, and, scarcely waiting to dress himself, hastened to ask if anyone had been to inquire for him.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** John, anyone · **What happens:** spring out, wait, dress, hasten, ask, be · **To what, where:** bed, John

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (John, anyone), 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:pg7277:22:73
# text = He sprang out of bed, and, scarcely waiting to dress himself, hastened to ask if anyone had been to inquire for him.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	sprang	spring	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	out	out	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	bed	bed	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
9	scarcely	scarcely	ADV	RB	_	10	advmod	_	_
10	waiting	wait	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	dress	dress	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	xcomp	_	_
13	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
15	hastened	hasten	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	2	conj	_	_
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	ask	ask	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	advcl	_	_
18	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	23	mark	_	_
19	anyone	anyone	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	23	nsubj	_	_
20	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	aux	_	_
21	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	23	cop	_	_
22	to	to	PART	TO	_	23	mark	_	_
23	inquire	inquire	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	ccomp	_	_
24	for	for	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **spring out** | past | John | bed |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Initial\_Location bed=Theme |
| 2 | **wait** | gerund | John *not said here* |  |  |  |  | scarcely *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **dress** | to-infinitive | John *not said here* | John |  |  |  |  | vn dress-41.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent himself=Patient |
| 4 | **hasten** | participle | John *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 5 | **ask** *speech: ask* | to-infinitive | John *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 6 | **is** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · perfect | anyone |  |  |  |  | for John; inquire *property* | tree rules |

<!-- .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 72](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/22/72/)
- next →: [sentence 74](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/22/74/)
- ↑ back to [The Little Soldier](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/22/)