---
title: I had better cover this hole," said he, "or people in the next house… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: I had better cover this hole," said he, "or people in the next house may see our deeds." Who acts: I, hole. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Tale of Ivan, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, The Tale of Ivan, sentence 40

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I had better cover this hole," said he, "or people in the next house may see our deeds."

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**Who acts:** I, hole · **What happens:** have, say, see · **To what, where:** better cover, deeds · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Tale of Ivan. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, hole), 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:pg7885:26:40
# text = I had better cover this hole," said he, "or people in the next house may see our deeds."
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	ccomp	_	_
3	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	4	amod	_	_
4	cover	cover	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
5	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	6	det	_	_
6	hole	hole	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
9	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
12	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	nsubj	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	next	next	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	_
19	may	may	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
20	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
21	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	22	nmod:poss	_	_
22	deeds	deed	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	20	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	20	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | I | better cover |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **see** | may | hole | our deeds |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer deed=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:** «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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