---
title: The table which covers itself is the earth becoming covered with flo… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The table which covers itself is the earth becoming covered with flowers and fruit at the bidding of the New Year. Who acts: table, earth. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, XXXIX. Ass, Table and Stick., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, XXXIX. Ass, Table and Stick., sentence 10

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The table which covers itself is the earth becoming covered with flowers and fruit at the bidding of the New Year.

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**Who acts:** table, earth · **What happens:** cover, be, become, bid · **To what, where:** table, earth, New Year

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This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, XXXIX. Ass, Table and Stick.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (table, earth), 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:pg7439:89:10
# text = The table which covers itself is the earth becoming covered with flowers and fruit at the bidding of the New Year.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	table	table	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
3	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	4	nsubj	_	_
4	covers	cover	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	acl:relcl	_	_
5	itself	itself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	4	obj	_	_
6	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	cop	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	earth	earth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
9	becoming	become	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	8	acl	_	_
10	covered	cover	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	9	xcomp	_	_
11	with	with	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	flowers	flower	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obl	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	fruit	fruit	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	_
15	at	at	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	bidding	bidding	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	_
18	of	of	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
20	New	New	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	compound	_	_
21	Year	Year	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **cover** | present | the table | table |  |  |  |  | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme itself=Destination |
| 2 | **is a** | present | the table | the earth |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **become** | gerund | the earth *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **cover** | participle | the earth *not said here* |  |  |  |  | with flowers and fruit at the bidding of the New Year | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent with flower=Theme |
| 5 | **bid** |  |  | the New Year |  |  |  |  | nom bidding «communication transitive»: of=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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