---
title: They had not sat long, when a vast number of rats and mice rushed in… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: They had not sat long, when a vast number of rats and mice rushed in, and devoured all the meat in an instant. Who acts: numbers, vast number. 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 59

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They had not sat long, when a vast number of rats and mice rushed in, and devoured all the meat in an instant.

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**Who acts:** numbers, vast number · **What happens:** not sit, rush in, devour · **To what, where:** meat, instant

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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 (numbers, vast number), 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:pg7439:37:59
# text = They had not sat long, when a vast number of rats and mice rushed in, and devoured all the meat in an instant.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
4	sat	sit	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
7	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	vast	vast	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	number	number	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	rats	rat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nmod	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	mice	mouse	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	conj	_	_
15	rushed	rush	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	4	conj	_	_
16	in	in	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	devoured	devour	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
20	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	22	det:predet	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	_
23	in	in	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	instant	instant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **sit** | past · perfect | numbers *= number* |  |  |  |  | long *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **rush in** | participle | a vast number of rats and mice |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **devour** | past | numbers *= number* *not said here* | all meat |  | a instant |  |  | vn devour-39.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent meat=Patient |

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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:** «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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