---
title: Then the Prince became most confidential and told the little creatur… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Then the Prince became most confidential and told the little creature why he had been sent out of his father’s kingdom. Who acts: Prince. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Biter Bit, part 4, sentence 85

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Then the Prince became most confidential and told the little creature why he had been sent out of his father’s kingdom.

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**Who acts:** Prince · **What happens:** become, tell, send · **To what, where:** little creature, Prince, kingdom · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Prince), 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:pg7277:29:85
# text = Then the Prince became most confidential and told the little creature why he had been sent out of his father’s kingdom.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	Prince	Prince	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	became	become	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	most	most	ADV	RBS	Degree=Sup	6	advmod	_	_
6	confidential	confidential	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	creature	creature	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
12	why	why	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	16	advmod	_	_
13	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
14	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
15	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	16	aux:pass	_	_
16	sent	send	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	8	ccomp	_	_
17	out	out	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
18	of	of	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
19	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	’s	's	PART	POS	_	20	case	_	_
22	kingdom	kingdom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **become** | past | the Prince |  |  |  | then | confidential *property* | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | the Prince *not said here* | the little creature |  |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP what S»: agent=Agent creature=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **send** | past · perfect · passive |  | Prince |  | Prince's father's kingdom |  |  | vn send-11.1-1 «NP V NP PP.initial\_location»: subject=Theme out kingdom=Initial\_Location |

<!-- .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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