---
title: Of course a Brownie is a funny little thing, half man, half goblin,… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Of course a Brownie is a funny little thing, half man, half goblin, with pointed ears and hairy hide. Who acts: hairy. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Cauld Lad of Hilton, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, The Cauld Lad of Hilton, sentence 8

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Of course a Brownie is a funny little thing, half man, half goblin, with pointed ears and hairy hide.

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**Who acts:** hairy · **What happens:** be, hide · **To what, where:** funny little thing, pointed ears

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This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Cauld Lad of Hilton. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hairy), 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:pg7439:44:8
# text = Of course a Brownie is a funny little thing, half man, half goblin, with pointed ears and hairy hide.
1	Of	of	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
2	course	course	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	fixed	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	Brownie	Brownie	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
5	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
7	funny	funny	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
8	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	half	half	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Frac	12	amod	_	_
12	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	half	half	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Frac	15	amod	_	_
15	goblin	goblin	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
17	with	with	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	pointed	pointed	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	ears	ear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	conj	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	22	cc	_	_
21	hairy	hairy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	nsubj	_	_
22	hide	hide	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present |  | a funny little thing and pointed ears |  |  |  | of a Brownie | tree rules |
| 2 | **hide** | present | hairy | pointed ears *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn concealment-16-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent ear=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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