---
title: When they came before the enemy, a battle took place, there was some… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When they came before the enemy, a battle took place, there was some hot fighting, and it rained bullets so thickly that his comrades fell around him on all sides. Who acts: they, battle, hot fighting, it. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Three Snake-leaves, with its dependen
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/46/5/)

<!-- 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/) / [The Three Snake-leaves](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/46/) / 5

# The Green Fairy Book, The Three Snake-leaves, sentence 5

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
When they came before the enemy, a battle took place, there was some hot fighting, and it rained bullets so thickly that his comrades fell around him on all sides.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** they, battle, hot fighting, it, comrades · **What happens:** come, take, be, rain, fall · **To what, where:** enemy, place, bullets, sides

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Three Snake-leaves. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (they, battle, hot fighting, it), 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:pg7277:46:5
# text = When they came before the enemy, a battle took place, there was some hot fighting, and it rained bullets so thickly that his comrades fell around him on all sides.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	3	advmod	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	advcl	_	_
4	before	before	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	enemy	enemy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	battle	battle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	_
10	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	place	place	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
13	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	14	expl	_	_
14	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	conj	_	_
15	some	some	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	17	det	_	_
16	hot	hot	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	fighting	fighting	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
20	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
21	rained	rain	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	conj	_	_
22	bullets	bullet	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	21	obj	_	_
23	so	so	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
24	thickly	thickly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	xcomp	_	_
25	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
26	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	27	nmod:poss	_	_
27	comrades	comrade	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	nsubj	_	_
28	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	advcl	_	_
29	around	around	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	obl	_	_
31	on	on	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
32	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	33	det	_	_
33	sides	side	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come** | past | they |  |  | the enemy |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme before enemy=Location |
| 2 | **take** | past | a battle | place |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent place=Theme |
| 3 | **be** | past | some hot fighting |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **rain** | past | it | bullets |  |  |  | thickly *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **fall** | past | fighting's comrades |  |  | all sides |  | around fighting | vn occur-48.3 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme around he=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.

<!-- 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 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/46/4/)
- next →: [sentence 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/46/6/)
- ↑ back to [The Three Snake-leaves](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7277/46/)