---
title: Well, he hadn't eaten but a mouthful or so, when he stops and begins… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Well, he hadn't eaten but a mouthful or so, when he stops and begins to laugh. Who acts: king. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Tom Tit Tot, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, Tom Tit Tot, sentence 96

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Well, he hadn't eaten but a mouthful or so, when he stops and begins to laugh.

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**Who acts:** king · **What happens:** not eat, stop, begin, laugh

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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), 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:pg7439:5:96
# text = Well, he hadn't eaten but a mouthful or so, when he stops and begins to laugh.
1	Well	well	INTJ	UH	_	6	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
4	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	6	advmod	_	_
6	eaten	eat	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
7	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	mouthful	mouthful	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	conj	_	_
10	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
11	so	so	ADV	RB	_	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	stops	stop	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	parataxis	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	begins	begin	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	15	conj	_	_
18	to	to	PART	TO	_	19	mark	_	_
19	laugh	laugh	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **eat** | past · perfect | king |  |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **stop** | present | king |  |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 3 | **begin** | present | king *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 4 | **laugh** | to-infinitive | king *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn nonverbal\_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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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