---
title: A King’s son once had a great desire to travel through the world, so… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: A King’s son once had a great desire to travel through the world, so he started off, taking no one with him but one trusty servant. Who acts: son. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Riddle, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Riddle, sentence 1

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A King’s son once had a great desire to travel through the world, so he started off, taking no one with him but one trusty servant.

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**Who acts:** son · **What happens:** have, travel, start off, take · **To what, where:** great desire, world, one

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Riddle. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (son), 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:pg7277:47:1
# text = A King’s son once had a great desire to travel through the world, so he started off, taking no one with him but one trusty servant.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	’s	's	PART	POS	_	2	case	_	_
4	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
5	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	6	advmod	_	_
6	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	desire	desire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	_
10	to	to	PART	TO	_	11	mark	_	_
11	travel	travel	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	acl	_	_
12	through	through	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
16	so	so	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
17	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	started	start	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
19	off	off	ADP	RP	_	18	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
21	taking	take	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	18	advcl	_	_
22	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	23	det	_	_
23	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	_
24	with	with	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nmod	_	_
26	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	29	cc	_	_
27	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	29	nummod	_	_
28	trusty	trusty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	29	amod	_	_
29	servant	servant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | a King's son | a great desire |  |  |  | once *property* | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent desire=Patient |
| 2 | **travel** | to-infinitive | a King's son *not said here* | a great desire *not said here* |  | the world |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through world=Trajectory |
| 3 | **start off** | past | son |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 4 | **take** | gerund | son *not said here* | no one but one trusty servant |  |  |  | with son | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent one=Theme |

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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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