---
title: “Now there's the flax,” says he, “and if that ain't spun up this nig… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “Now there's the flax,” says he, “and if that ain't spun up this night, off goes your head.” Who acts: flax, off. 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/pg7439/5/57/)

<!-- 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/) / 57

# English Fairy Tales, Tom Tit Tot, sentence 57

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
“Now there's the flax,” says he, “and if that ain't spun up this night, off goes your head.”

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** flax, off · **What happens:** be, say, not spin up, go · **To what, where:** husband, head · **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 (flax, off), 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:pg7439:5:57
# text = “Now there's the flax,” says he, “and if that ain't spun up this night, off goes your head.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
3	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	4	expl	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	's	be	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	ccomp	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	flax	flax	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
9	says	say	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj:pass	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
12	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
14	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
15	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	18	nsubj:pass	_	_
16	ai	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux:pass	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	18	advmod	_	_
18	spun	spin	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	9	ccomp	_	_
19	up	up	ADP	RP	_	18	compound:prt	_	_
20	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	21	det	_	_
21	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl:unmarked	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
23	off	off	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nsubj	_	_
24	goes	go	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	conj	_	_
25	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	24	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** *in a quote* | present | the flax |  |  | there | now |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | present |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **not** **spin up** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | present · passive |  | husband |  |  | night |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V ADJ.result»: subject=Result |
| 4 | **go** *in a quote* | present | off | your head |  |  |  |  | vn meander-47.7 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location head=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.

<!-- 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 56](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/56/)
- next →: [sentence 58](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/58/)
- ↑ back to [Tom Tit Tot](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg7439/5/)