---
title: When he entered the town he saw before him a great splendid house, w… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When he entered the town he saw before him a great splendid house, with soldiers standing before the gates. Who acts: Medio, soldiers. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Half-chick, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Half-chick, sentence 52

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When he entered the town he saw before him a great splendid house, with soldiers standing before the gates.

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**Who acts:** Medio, soldiers · **What happens:** enter, see, stand · **To what, where:** town, great splendid house, gates

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Half-chick. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Medio, soldiers), 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:pg7277:6:52
# text = When he entered the town he saw before him a great splendid house, with soldiers standing before the gates.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	3	advmod	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	entered	enter	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	advcl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	before	before	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	obl	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
11	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
12	splendid	splendid	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	with	with	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	soldiers	soldier	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	conj	_	_
17	standing	stand	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	16	acl	_	_
18	before	before	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	gates	gate	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **enter** | past | Medio | the town |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme town=Destination |
| 2 | **see** | past | Medio | a great splendid house and soldiers |  |  | before Madrid |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer house=Stimulus |
| 3 | **stand** | gerund | soldiers *not said here* |  |  | the gates |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent before gate=Location |

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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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