---
title: "Now," said he to the story-teller, "what kind of animal would you r… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: "Now," said he to the story-teller, "what kind of animal would you rather be, a deer, a fox, or a hare? Who acts: man, kind. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Story-teller At Fault, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, The Story-teller At Fault, sentence 60

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"Now," said he to the story-teller, "what kind of animal would you rather be, a deer, a fox, or a hare?

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**Who acts:** man, kind · **What happens:** say, be · **To what, where:** hare, story teller, deer · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Story-teller At Fault. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, kind), 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:pg7885:20:60
# text = "Now," said he to the story-teller, "what kind of animal would you rather be, a deer, a fox, or a hare?
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	5	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
5	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
7	to	to	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
9	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	teller	teller	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
13	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	what	what	DET	WDT	PronType=Int	15	det	_	_
15	kind	kind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nsubj	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	animal	animal	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod	_	_
18	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
19	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
20	rather	rather	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
21	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	24	cop	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	deer	deer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	fox	fox	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
29	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	31	cc	_	_
30	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
31	hare	hare	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: ask* | past | man | a hare | the story teller |  | now |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to teller=Recipient |
| 2 | **is a** *in a quote* | would | what kind of animal | a deer and a fox |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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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