---
title: Many and many a time, when he met other farmers at the nearest marke… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Many and many a time, when he met other farmers at the nearest market town, they would teaze him, asking how it came about that he was childless. Who acts: farmer, children, thing. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jack My Hedgehog, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of e
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, Jack My Hedgehog, sentence 3

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Many and many a time, when he met other farmers at the nearest market town, they would teaze him, asking how it came about that he was childless.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** farmer, children, thing · **What happens:** meet, teaze, ask, come about, be · **To what, where:** other farmers, nearest market town, farmer · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jack My Hedgehog. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (farmer, children, thing), 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:pg7277:48:3
# text = Many and many a time, when he met other farmers at the nearest market town, they would teaze him, asking how it came about that he was childless.
1	Many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
2	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	_
3	many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	1	conj	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl:unmarked	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	9	advmod	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	met	meet	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	acl:relcl	_	_
10	other	other	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	farmers	farmer	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obj	_	_
12	at	at	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
14	nearest	near	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	16	amod	_	_
15	market	market	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	compound	_	_
16	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
18	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
19	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
20	teaze	teaze	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
21	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
23	asking	ask	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	20	advcl	_	_
24	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	26	advmod	_	_
25	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
26	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	ccomp	_	_
27	about	about	ADP	IN	_	26	obl	_	_
28	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	31	mark	_	_
29	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	31	nsubj	_	_
30	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	31	cop	_	_
31	childless	childless	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	20	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **meet** | past | farmer | other farmers |  | the nearest market town |  |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent farmer=Co-Agent |
| 2 | **teaze** | would | children *= child* | farmer |  |  | time |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | gerund | children *= child* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **come about** | past | thing |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **is** | past | farmer |  |  |  |  | childless *property* | tree rules |

<!-- .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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