---
title: The trees grew so thick and near together that it was almost impossi… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The trees grew so thick and near together that it was almost impossible to see through them, only straight in front of him lay a little patch of meadowland. Who acts: trees. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of eve
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/27/37/)

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Biter Bit, part 2, sentence 37

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The trees grew so thick and near together that it was almost impossible to see through them, only straight in front of him lay a little patch of meadowland.

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**Who acts:** trees · **What happens:** grow, be, see, lay · **To what, where:** little patch, front

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (trees), 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:pg7277:27:37
# text = The trees grew so thick and near together that it was almost impossible to see through them, only straight in front of him lay a little patch of meadowland.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	trees	tree	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	grew	grow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	so	so	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	thick	thick	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	xcomp	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
7	near	near	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	together	together	ADV	RB	_	13	obl	_	_
9	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
10	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	expl	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	cop	_	_
12	almost	almost	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	_
13	impossible	impossible	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	conj	_	_
14	to	to	PART	TO	_	15	mark	_	_
15	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	xcomp	_	_
16	through	through	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
19	only	only	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
20	straight	straight	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
21	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	front	front	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	_
23	of	of	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nmod	_	_
25	lay	lay	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	advcl	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
27	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	28	amod	_	_
28	patch	patch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	_
29	of	of	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	meadowland	meadowland	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **grow** | past | the trees |  |  |  |  | thick *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **is** | past | the trees *not said here* |  |  |  |  | almost, impossible *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **see** | to-infinitive | the trees *not said here* |  |  |  |  | through trees *= tree* | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 4 | **lay** | present | the trees *not said here* | a little patch of meadowland |  | front of Prince |  |  | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent patch=Theme in front=Destination |

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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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