---
title: The king was coming down the street, and he heard her sing, but what… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The king was coming down the street, and he heard her sing, but what she sang he couldn't hear, so he stopped and said: Who acts: king, Darter. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Tom Tit Tot, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/21/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [English Fairy Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/) / [Tom Tit Tot](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/) / 21

# English Fairy Tales, Tom Tit Tot, sentence 21

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The king was coming down the street, and he heard her sing, but what she sang he couldn't hear, so he stopped and said:

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** king, Darter · **What happens:** come down, hear, sing, not hear, stop, say · **To what, where:** street, sing · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Tom Tit Tot. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (king, Darter), 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:pg7439:5:21
# text = The king was coming down the street, and he heard her sing, but what she sang he couldn't hear, so he stopped and said:
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	coming	come	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	down	down	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	street	street	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
12	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	sing	sing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	11	parataxis	_	_
17	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	sang	sing	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	acl:relcl	_	_
19	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
20	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	22	advmod	_	_
22	hear	hear	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
24	so	so	ADV	RB	_	26	advmod	_	_
25	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
26	stopped	stop	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
28	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come down** | past · progressive | the king | the street |  |  |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location street=Theme |
| 2 | **hear** | past | king | Darter's sing |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer sing=Stimulus |
| 3 | **sing** *speech: express* | past | Darter |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **not** **hear** | could | king |  |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V PP.stimulus»: agent=Experiencer |
| 5 | **stop** | past | king |  |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 6 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | king *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 20](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/20/)
- next →: [sentence 22](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/22/)
- ↑ back to [Tom Tit Tot](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/)