---
title: When she took the cover off and told him to look, he could hardly be… — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: When she took the cover off and told him to look, he could hardly believe his eyes. Who acts: supper, son. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, How the Dog and Cat Came to Be Enemies, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, How the Dog and Cat Came to Be Enemies, sentence 28

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When she took the cover off and told him to look, he could hardly believe his eyes.

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**Who acts:** supper, son · **What happens:** take off, tell, look, believe · **To what, where:** cover, son, eyes · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, How the Dog and Cat Came to Be Enemies. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (supper, son), 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:pg75089:14:28
# text = When she took the cover off and told him to look, he could hardly believe his eyes.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	3	advmod	_	_
2	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	cover	cover	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	off	off	ADP	RP	_	3	compound:prt	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
9	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	iobj	_	_
10	to	to	PART	TO	_	11	mark	_	_
11	look	look	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
14	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
15	hardly	hardly	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	_
16	believe	believe	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	conj	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take off** | past | supper | the cover |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent cover=Theme |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | supper *not said here* |  | son |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent he=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **look** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | supper *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus |
| 4 | **believe** | could | son | son's eyes |  |  |  | hardly *property* | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer eye=Stimulus |

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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:** «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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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