---
title: He was forced to walk slowly--slowly upon tip-toe, hardly venturing… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He was forced to walk slowly--slowly upon tip-toe, hardly venturing to breathe. Who acts: Prince. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Vivien and the Princess Placida, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, Prince Vivien and the Princess Placida, part 4, sentence 12

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He was forced to walk slowly--slowly upon tip-toe, hardly venturing to breathe.

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**Who acts:** Prince · **What happens:** force, walk, venture, breathe · **To what, where:** Prince, tip toe

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Vivien and the Princess Placida, 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:pg7277:39:12
# text = He was forced to walk slowly--slowly upon tip-toe, hardly venturing to breathe.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux:pass	_	_
3	forced	force	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	walk	walk	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	slowly	slowly	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	slowly	slowly	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
9	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
10	tip	tip	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	toe	toe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	hardly	hardly	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	venturing	venture	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	3	advcl	_	_
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	breathe	breathe	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **force** | past · passive |  | Prince |  |  |  |  | vn urge-58.1-1 «NP V NP S\_ING»: subject=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 2 | **walk** | to-infinitive | Prince *not said here* |  |  | tip toe |  | slowly *property* | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme upon toe=Trajectory |
| 3 | **venture** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | hardly *property* | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **breathe** | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn breathe-40.1.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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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