---
title: "I met a servant at the postern gate in the wall," replied Alice in… — Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains · tree and pragmatics
description: "I met a servant at the postern gate in the wall," replied Alice in a constrained voice. " Who acts: Alice. A sentence of «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, A Historical Tale., part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains, A Historical Tale., part 3, sentence 22

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"I met a servant at the postern gate in the wall," replied Alice in a constrained voice. "

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**Who acts:** Alice · **What happens:** meet, reply, constrain · **To what, where:** servant, postern gate, constrained voice · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, A Historical Tale., part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Alice), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg74323:20:22
# text = "I met a servant at the postern gate in the wall," replied Alice in a constrained voice. "
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	met	meet	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	ccomp	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	servant	servant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	at	at	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	postern	postern	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	compound	_	_
9	gate	gate	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
10	in	in	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	wall	wall	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
15	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
16	Alice	Alice	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	constrained	constrain	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	20	amod	_	_
20	voice	voice	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	_
22	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **meet** *in a quote* | past | Alice | a servant |  | the postern gate in the wall |  |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent servant=Co-Agent |
| 2 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | Alice |  |  | a constrained voice |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V S-Quote»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **constrain** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn limit-76 «NP V NP»: agent=Causer |

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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:** «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.

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