---
title: “I will not take the eldest girl, for fear she should be too old, no… — Folk tales from Tibet · tree and pragmatics
description: “I will not take the eldest girl, for fear she should be too old, nor the youngest, for fear she should be too young. Who acts: Boy, girl. A sentence of «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, The Story of the Boy With the Deformed Head., with its dependency tree and the 
---

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# Folk tales from Tibet, The Story of the Boy With the Deformed Head., sentence 35

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“I will not take the eldest girl, for fear she should be too old, nor the youngest, for fear she should be too young.

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**Who acts:** Boy, girl · **What happens:** not take, be · **To what, where:** eldest girl

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This is a sentence of «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, The Story of the Boy With the Deformed Head.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Boy, girl), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg75000:16:35
# text = “I will not take the eldest girl, for fear she should be too old, nor the youngest, for fear she should be too young.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	take	take	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	eldest	eld	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	8	amod	_	_
8	girl	girl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
10	for	for	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	fear	fear	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	_
12	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
13	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
14	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	cop	_	_
15	too	too	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	_
16	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
18	nor	nor	CCONJ	CC	Polarity=Neg	20	cc	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	youngest	young	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	5	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
22	for	for	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	fear	fear	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obl	_	_
24	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
25	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
26	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	cop	_	_
27	too	too	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
28	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **take** *in a quote* | future | Boy |  | the eldest girl |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP ADVP»: agent=Instrument girl=Destination |
| 2 | **is** *in a quote* | should | girl |  |  |  |  | for fear; old *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** *in a quote* | should | girl |  |  |  |  | for fear; young *property* | tree rules |

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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:** «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, Project Gutenberg book 75000 (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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