---
title: The years passed happily, and three children were born to the shephe… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The years passed happily, and three children were born to the shepherd and the lake-maiden. Who acts: years. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Shepherd of Myddvai, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, The Shepherd of Myddvai, sentence 18

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The years passed happily, and three children were born to the shepherd and the lake-maiden.

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**Who acts:** years · **What happens:** pass, bear · **To what, where:** three children

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Shepherd of Myddvai. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (years), 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:pg7885:11:18
# text = The years passed happily, and three children were born to the shepherd and the lake-maiden.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	years	year	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	passed	pass	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	happily	happily	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
7	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	8	nummod	_	_
8	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nsubj:pass	_	_
9	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	aux:pass	_	_
10	born	bear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	conj	_	_
11	to	to	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	shepherd	shepherd	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
16	lake	lake	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	maiden	maiden	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	conj	_	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 | **pass** | past | the years |  |  |  |  | happily *property* | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **bear** | past · passive |  | three children |  |  |  | to the shepherd and the lake maiden | vn birth-28.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=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:** «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7885 (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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