---
title: Once upon a time when pigs spoke rhyme And monkeys chewed tobacco, A… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time when pigs spoke rhyme And monkeys chewed tobacco, And hens took snuff to make them tough, And ducks went quack, quack, quack, O! Who acts: pigs, monkeys, hens, ducks. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Magpie's Nest, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics
---

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# English Fairy Tales, The Magpie's Nest, sentence 1

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Once upon a time when pigs spoke rhyme And monkeys chewed tobacco, And hens took snuff to make them tough, And ducks went quack, quack, quack, O!

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** pigs, monkeys, hens, ducks · **What happens:** speak, chew, take, make, go · **To what, where:** rhyme, tobacco, snuff, hens, quack · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Magpie's Nest. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (pigs, monkeys, hens, ducks), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg7439:42:1
# text = Once upon a time when pigs spoke rhyme And monkeys chewed tobacco, And hens took snuff to make them tough, And ducks went quack, quack, quack, O!
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	7	advmod	_	_
2	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	obl	_	_
5	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	7	advmod	_	_
6	pigs	pig	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	nsubj	_	_
7	spoke	speak	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	rhyme	rhyme	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
9	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	monkeys	monkey	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	conj	_	_
11	chewed	chew	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	acl	_	_
12	tobacco	tobacco	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
14	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
15	hens	hen	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj	_	_
16	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
17	snuff	snuff	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	_
18	to	to	PART	TO	_	19	mark	_	_
19	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	advcl	_	_
20	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	_
21	tough	tough	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
23	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
24	ducks	duck	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nsubj	_	_
25	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
26	quack	quack	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
28	quack	quack	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	_
30	quack	quack	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
32	O	o	INTJ	UH	_	25	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **speak** *speech: other* | past | pigs | rhyme and monkeys |  |  |  | once *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **chew** | participle | monkeys *not said here* | tobacco |  |  |  |  | vn chew-39.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent tobacco=Patient |
| 3 | **take** | past | hens | snuff |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent snuff=Theme |
| 4 | **make** | to-infinitive | hens *not said here* | hens *= hen* |  |  |  | tough *property* | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset they=Product |
| 5 | **go** | past | ducks | quack and quack and quack |  |  |  |  | vn meander-47.7 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location quack=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.

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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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