---
title: While they were eating and chatting, what should come by but a poor… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: While they were eating and chatting, what should come by but a poor half-starved cat, and the moll-row he gave out of him would make your heart ache. Who acts: potatoes, row, moll row, your. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Jack and His Comrades, with its dependency tree and the 
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, Jack and His Comrades, sentence 26

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
While they were eating and chatting, what should come by but a poor half-starved cat, and the moll-row he gave out of him would make your heart ache.

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**Who acts:** potatoes, row, moll row, your · **What happens:** eat, chat, come, starve, give out, make · **To what, where:** cat, heart ache

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Jack and His Comrades. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (potatoes, row, moll row, your), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg7885:18:26
# text = While they were eating and chatting, what should come by but a poor half-starved cat, and the moll-row he gave out of him would make your heart ache.
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	eating	eat	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
6	chatting	chat	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	10	nsubj	_	_
9	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
10	come	come	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	advcl	_	_
11	by	by	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
12	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
14	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
15	half	half	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing|NumForm=Word|NumType=Frac	17	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	starved	starve	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	18	amod	_	_
18	cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	31	cc	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
22	moll	moll	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	22	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	row	row	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	31	nsubj	_	_
25	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
26	gave	give	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	acl:relcl	_	_
27	out	out	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	of	of	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
29	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	obl	_	_
30	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	31	aux	_	_
31	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	_
32	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	34	nmod:poss	_	_
33	heart	heart	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	34	compound	_	_
34	ache	ache	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	31	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **eat** | past · progressive | potatoes *= potato* |  |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **chat** *speech: other* | gerund | potatoes *= potato* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn chit\_chat-37.6 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **come** | should |  |  |  |  |  | by a poor starved cat | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme by cat=Location |
| 4 | **starve** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **give out** | past | row | cat |  |  |  |  | vn contribute-13.2 «NP V NP.theme (PP)»: agent=Agent he=Theme |
| 6 | **make** | would | the moll row | your heart ache |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset ache=Product |
| 7 | **ache** |  | your |  |  |  |  |  | nom ache «state intransitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .note -->
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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