---
title: Here were a number of ducks resting near a little stream, and plumin… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Here were a number of ducks resting near a little stream, and pluming, themselves with their bills, whilst they kept up an animated conversation amongst themselves. Who acts: number, ducks, bills. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The White Snake, with its dependency tree and the 
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The White Snake, sentence 16

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Here were a number of ducks resting near a little stream, and pluming, themselves with their bills, whilst they kept up an animated conversation amongst themselves.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** number, ducks, bills · **What happens:** be, rest, plume, keep up, bill · **To what, where:** little stream, ducks, animated conversation

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The White Snake. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (number, ducks, bills), 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:pg7277:50:16
# text = Here were a number of ducks resting near a little stream, and pluming, themselves with their bills, whilst they kept up an animated conversation amongst themselves.
1	Here	here	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	0	root	_	_
2	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	1	cop	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	number	number	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	nsubj	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	ducks	duck	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nmod	_	_
7	resting	rest	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	6	acl	_	_
8	near	near	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	stream	stream	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
14	pluming	plume	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	23	csubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
16	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	14	obl	_	_
17	with	with	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	bills	bill	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	whilst	whilst	SCONJ	IN	_	23	mark	_	_
22	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	kept	keep	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	1	parataxis	_	_
24	up	up	ADP	RP	_	23	compound:prt	_	_
25	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
26	animated	animated	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	amod	_	_
27	conversation	conversation	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	_
28	amongst	amongst	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
29	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | a number of ducks |  |  |  |  | here *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **rest** | gerund | ducks *not said here* |  |  | a little stream |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme near stream=Location |
| 3 | **plume** | gerund |  | ducks *= duck* |  |  |  | with ducks's bills | tree rules |
| 4 | **keep up** | past | bills *= bill* | a animated conversation |  |  |  | amongst bills *= bill* | vn sustain-55.6 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent conversation=Theme |
| 5 | **bill** |  | ducks *= duck* |  |  |  |  |  | nom bill «communication transitive»: poss=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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