---
title: ‘What do I see?’ he cried; ‘this spindle seems to wish to point out… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘What do I see?’ he cried; ‘this spindle seems to wish to point out the way to me.’ Who acts: I, son, spindle. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Spindle, Shuttle, and Needle, 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/pg7277/44/28/)

<!-- 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/) / [Spindle, Shuttle, and Needle](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/44/) / 28

# The Green Fairy Book, Spindle, Shuttle, and Needle, sentence 28

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘What do I see?’ he cried; ‘this spindle seems to wish to point out the way to me.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** I, son, spindle · **What happens:** see, cry, seem, wish, point out · **To what, where:** way, me

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Spindle, Shuttle, and Needle. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, son, spindle), 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:pg7277:44:28
# text = ‘What do I see?’ he cried; ‘this spindle seems to wish to point out the way to me.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	5	obj	_	_
3	do	do	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	cried	cry	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	_
11	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	13	det	_	_
13	spindle	spindle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
14	seems	seem	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	conj	_	_
15	to	to	PART	TO	_	16	mark	_	_
16	wish	wish	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	xcomp	_	_
17	to	to	PART	TO	_	18	mark	_	_
18	point	point	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	xcomp	_	_
19	out	out	ADP	RP	_	18	compound:prt	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	_
22	to	to	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	14	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | present · do-support | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer what=Stimulus |
| 2 | **cry** *speech: express* | past | son |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **seem** | present | this spindle |  |  |  |  |  | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute |
| 4 | **wish** | to-infinitive | this spindle *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V for NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme |
| 5 | **point out** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | this spindle *not said here* | the way | me |  |  |  | vn wink-40.3.1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent way=Theme to i=Recipient |

<!-- .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 27](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/44/27/)
- next →: [sentence 29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/44/29/)
- ↑ back to [Spindle, Shuttle, and Needle](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/44/)