---
title: They ran at such a pace to the door of the ruined castle that the ow… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: They ran at such a pace to the door of the ruined castle that the owl could scarcely keep up with them. Who acts: storks, owl. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Caliph Stork, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Story of Caliph Stork, sentence 165

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They ran at such a pace to the door of the ruined castle that the owl could scarcely keep up with them.

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**Who acts:** storks, owl · **What happens:** run, ruin, keep up

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Caliph Stork. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (storks, owl), 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:pg7277:7:165
# text = They ran at such a pace to the door of the ruined castle that the owl could scarcely keep up with them.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	ran	run	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	at	at	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
4	such	such	DET	PDT	PronType=Ind	6	det:predet	_	_
5	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	pace	pace	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
7	to	to	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	door	door	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	ruined	ruin	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	13	amod	_	_
13	castle	castle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	_
14	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	19	mark	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	owl	owl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	_
17	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	scarcely	scarcely	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
19	keep	keep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	advcl	_	_
20	up	up	ADP	RP	_	19	compound:prt	_	_
21	with	with	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **run** | past | storks *= stork* |  |  |  |  | at such pace; to the door of the ruined castle *result* | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.result»: agent=Theme to door=Result |
| 2 | **ruin** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn destroy-44 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **keep up** | could | the owl |  |  |  |  | with storks *= stork*; scarcely *property* | vn sustain-55.6 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent |

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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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