---
title: The next day he saw a girl with a cat, and asked her, “Will you let… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The next day he saw a girl with a cat, and asked her, “Will you let me have that cat for a penny?” Who acts: Dick, girl. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Whittington and His Cat, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, Whittington and His Cat, sentence 32

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The next day he saw a girl with a cat, and asked her, “Will you let me have that cat for a penny?”

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**Who acts:** Dick, girl · **What happens:** see, ask, let, have · **To what, where:** girl, Dick, cat · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Whittington and His Cat. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Dick, girl), 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:pg7439:37:32
# text = The next day he saw a girl with a cat, and asked her, “Will you let me have that cat for a penny?”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	next	next	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl:unmarked	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	girl	girl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
8	with	with	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
14	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	iobj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	Will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	ccomp	_	_
20	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	_
21	have	have	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	xcomp	_	_
22	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	23	det	_	_
23	cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	_
24	for	for	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	penny	penny	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	19	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | past | Dick | a girl |  |  | day | with a cat | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer girl=Stimulus |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | Dick *not said here* |  | girl |  |  |  | vn urge-58.1-1-1 «NP V NP that S»: agent=Agent she=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **let** *in a quote* | future | girl | Dick |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **have** *in a quote* | infinitive | Dick *not said here* | that cat |  |  |  | for a penny | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent cat=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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