---
title: I had thought to find a powerful robber, and instead of that I have… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: I had thought to find a powerful robber, and instead of that I have seen the most miserable creature I can imagine. Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Golden Mermaid, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Golden Mermaid, sentence 30

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I had thought to find a powerful robber, and instead of that I have seen the most miserable creature I can imagine.

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** think, find, see, imagine · **To what, where:** powerful robber, miserable creature

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Golden Mermaid. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I), 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:pg7277:52:30
# text = I had thought to find a powerful robber, and instead of that I have seen the most miserable creature I can imagine.
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	thought	think	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	find	find	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	powerful	powerful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	robber	robber	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
11	instead	instead	ADV	RB	ExtPos=ADP	13	case	_	_
12	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	fixed	_	_
13	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	16	obl	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
15	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	seen	see	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	3	conj	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
18	most	most	ADV	RBS	Degree=Sup	19	advmod	_	_
19	miserable	miserable	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	creature	creature	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	_
21	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
22	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	23	aux	_	_
23	imagine	imagine	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	20	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **think** *speech: other* | past · perfect | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 2 | **find** | to-infinitive | I *not said here* | a powerful robber |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent robber=Topic |
| 3 | **see** | present · perfect | I | the miserable creature |  |  |  | instead that | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer creature=Stimulus |
| 4 | **imagine** | can | I | the miserable creature *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot creature=Theme |

<!-- .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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