---
title: Reynard dropped his prize like a hot potato, and was off like shot,… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Reynard dropped his prize like a hot potato, and was off like shot, and the poor cock came back fluttering and trembling to Jack and his comrades. Who acts: Reynard, poor cock. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Jack and His Comrades, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of 
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, Jack and His Comrades, sentence 35

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Reynard dropped his prize like a hot potato, and was off like shot, and the poor cock came back fluttering and trembling to Jack and his comrades.

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**Who acts:** Reynard, poor cock · **What happens:** drop off, come back, flutter, tremble · **To what, where:** prize, Jack

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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 (Reynard, poor cock), 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:pg7885:18:35
# text = Reynard dropped his prize like a hot potato, and was off like shot, and the poor cock came back fluttering and trembling to Jack and his comrades.
1	Reynard	Reynard	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
2	dropped	drop	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	4	nmod:poss	_	_
4	prize	prize	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
5	like	like	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	hot	hot	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	potato	potato	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	cop	_	_
12	off	off	ADP	RP	_	2	compound:prt	_	_
13	like	like	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	shot	shot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	cock	cock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
20	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
21	back	back	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
22	fluttering	flutter	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	20	advcl	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
24	trembling	tremble	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	22	conj	_	_
25	to	to	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
26	Jack	Jack	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	24	obl	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	29	cc	_	_
28	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	29	nmod:poss	_	_
29	comrades	comrade	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	26	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **drop off** | past | Reynard | Reynard's prize |  |  |  | like a hot potato; like shot | vn put\_direction-9.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent prize=Theme |
| 2 | **come back** | past | the poor cock |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **flutter** | gerund | the poor cock *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn modes\_of\_being\_with\_motion-47.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **tremble** | gerund | the poor cock *not said here* |  | Jack and Jack's comrades |  |  |  | vn modes\_of\_being\_with\_motion-47.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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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