---
title: At last she took some coals, saying to herself, "No answer means yes… — Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains · tree and pragmatics
description: At last she took some coals, saying to herself, "No answer means yes," carried them home and laid them on the hearth, but they would not burn. Who acts: discovery, answer, coals. A sentence of «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, Legends and Tales., part 10, with its dependenc
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74323/11/36/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74323/) / [Legends and Tales., part 10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74323/11/) / 36

# Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains, Legends and Tales., part 10, sentence 36

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
At last she took some coals, saying to herself, "No answer means yes," carried them home and laid them on the hearth, but they would not burn.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** discovery, answer, coals · **What happens:** take, say, mean, carry, lay, not burn · **To what, where:** coals, last, discovery, hearth · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, Legends and Tales., part 10. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (discovery, answer, coals), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg74323:11:36
# text = At last she took some coals, saying to herself, "No answer means yes," carried them home and laid them on the hearth, but they would not burn.
1	At	at	ADP	IN	_	2	case	_	_
2	last	last	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	obl	_	_
3	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	some	some	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	6	det	_	_
6	coals	coal	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
8	saying	say	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	advcl	_	_
9	to	to	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	herself	herself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
12	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	No	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	14	det	_	_
14	answer	answer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
15	means	mean	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	ccomp	_	_
16	yes	yes	INTJ	UH	Polarity=Pos	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	_
19	carried	carry	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	parataxis	_	_
20	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	_
21	home	home	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
23	laid	lay	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	conj	_	_
24	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	obj	_	_
25	on	on	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	hearth	hearth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	33	punct	_	_
29	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	33	cc	_	_
30	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	33	nsubj	_	_
31	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	33	aux	_	_
32	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	33	advmod	_	_
33	burn	burn	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take** | past | discovery | some coals |  | last |  |  | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP PP.source NP.asset»: agent=Agent coal=Theme at last=Asset |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | gerund | discovery *not said here* |  | discovery |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to herself=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **mean** *in a quote* | present | no answer |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **carry** | past |  | coals *= coal* |  |  |  | home *property* | vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |
| 5 | **lay** | past |  | coals *= coal* |  | the hearth |  |  | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent they=Theme on hearth=Destination |
| 6 | **not** **burn** | would | coals *= coal* |  |  |  |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V»: agent=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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, Project Gutenberg book 74323 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 35](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74323/11/35/)
- next →: [sentence 37](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74323/11/37/)
- ↑ back to [Legends and Tales., part 10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74323/11/)