---
title: So poor Tommy Grimes had to creep under the sofa, and Mr. Miacca sat… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: So poor Tommy Grimes had to creep under the sofa, and Mr. Miacca sat on it and waited for the pot to boil. Who acts: poor Tommy Grimes, Miacca. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Mr. Miacca, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, Mr. Miacca, sentence 28

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So poor Tommy Grimes had to creep under the sofa, and Mr. Miacca sat on it and waited for the pot to boil.

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**Who acts:** poor Tommy Grimes, Miacca · **What happens:** have, creep, sit, wait, boil · **To what, where:** sofa

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This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Mr. Miacca. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (poor Tommy Grimes, Miacca), 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:pg7439:36:28
# text = So poor Tommy Grimes had to creep under the sofa, and Mr. Miacca sat on it and waited for the pot to boil.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
2	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
3	Tommy	Tommy	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	compound	_	_
4	Grimes	grime	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nsubj	_	_
5	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	creep	creep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	xcomp	_	_
8	under	under	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	sofa	sofa	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
13	Mr.	Mr.	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	14	nmod:desc	_	_
14	Miacca	Miacca	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
15	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	_
16	on	on	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obl	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	waited	wait	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	conj	_	_
20	for	for	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	pot	pot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
23	to	to	PART	TO	_	24	mark	_	_
24	boil	boil	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | poor Tommy Grimes |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **creep** | to-infinitive | poor Tommy Grimes *not said here* |  |  | the sofa |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme under sofa=Trajectory |
| 3 | **sit** | past | Miacca  Mr. |  |  | sofa |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on it=Location |
| 4 | **wait** | past | Miacca  Mr. *not said here* |  |  |  |  | for the pot | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **boil** | to-infinitive | Miacca  Mr. *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn cooking-45.3 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |

<!-- .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:** «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7439 (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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