--- title: He had hardly gone a few steps when he heard a sound behind him, and… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics description: He had hardly gone a few steps when he heard a sound behind him, and, looking round, he saw a carriage made of cardboard, drawn by six big rats, coming towards him. Who acts: Prince, carriage. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 5, with its dependency tree and th --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/30/26/) [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 Biter Bit, part 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/30/) / 26 # The Green Fairy Book, The Biter Bit, part 5, sentence 26 He had hardly gone a few steps when he heard a sound behind him, and, looking round, he saw a carriage made of cardboard, drawn by six big rats, coming towards him. **Who acts:** Prince, carriage · **What happens:** go, hear, look round, see, make, draw · **To what, where:** few steps, sound, carriage This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Prince, carriage), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. **Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg7277:2395`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = book:pg7277:30:26 # text = He had hardly gone a few steps when he heard a sound behind him, and, looking round, he saw a carriage made of cardboard, drawn by six big rats, coming towards him. 1 He he PRON PRP Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 4 nsubj _ _ 2 had have AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 4 aux _ _ 3 hardly hardly ADV RB _ 4 advmod _ _ 4 gone go VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part 0 root _ _ 5 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 7 det _ _ 6 few few ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 7 amod _ _ 7 steps step NOUN NNS Number=Plur 4 obl:unmarked _ _ 8 when when ADV WRB PronType=Int 10 advmod _ _ 9 he he PRON PRP Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 10 nsubj _ _ 10 heard hear VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 4 advcl _ _ 11 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 12 det _ _ 12 sound sound NOUN NN Number=Sing 10 obj _ _ 13 behind behind ADP IN _ 14 case _ _ 14 him he PRON PRP Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 10 obl _ _ 15 , , PUNCT , _ 22 punct _ _ 16 and and CCONJ CC _ 22 cc _ _ 17 , , PUNCT , _ 18 punct _ _ 18 looking look VERB VBG Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part 22 advcl _ _ 19 round round ADV RB _ 18 advmod _ _ 20 , , PUNCT , _ 18 punct _ _ 21 he he PRON PRP Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 22 nsubj _ _ 22 saw see VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 4 conj _ _ 23 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 24 det _ _ 24 carriage carriage NOUN NN Number=Sing 22 obj _ _ 25 made make VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 24 acl _ _ 26 of of ADP IN _ 27 case _ _ 27 cardboard cardboard NOUN NN Number=Sing 25 obl _ _ 28 , , PUNCT , _ 29 punct _ _ 29 drawn draw VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 24 acl _ _ 30 by by ADP IN _ 33 case _ _ 31 six six NUM CD NumForm=Word|NumType=Card 33 nummod _ _ 32 big big ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 33 amod _ _ 33 rats rat NOUN NNS Number=Plur 29 obl _ _ 34 , , PUNCT , _ 35 punct _ _ 35 coming come VERB VBG Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part 22 xcomp _ _ 36 towards towards ADP IN _ 37 case _ _ 37 him he PRON PRP Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 35 obl _ _ 38 . . PUNCT . _ 4 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **go** | past · perfect | Prince | a few steps | | | | hardly *property* | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | | 2 | **hear** | past | Prince | a sound | | | | behind father | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer sound=Stimulus | | 3 | **look round** | gerund | Prince *not said here* | | | | | round *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus | | 4 | **see** | past | Prince | a carriage | | | | | tree rules | | 5 | **make** | participle | | a carriage *not said here* | | | | of cardboard | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset | | 6 | **draw** | participle | | a carriage *not said here* | | | | by six big rats | vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | | 7 | **come** | gerund | a carriage *not said here* | | | | | towards Prince | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme towards he=Initial\_Location | 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. **Text:** «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 7277 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order. - ← previous: [sentence 25](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/30/25/) - next →: [sentence 27](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/30/27/) - ↑ back to [The Biter Bit, part 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/30/)