---
title: There was once a farmer who was seeking a servant, and the wren met… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: There was once a farmer who was seeking a servant, and the wren met him and said: "What are you seeking?" Who acts: farmer, wren, you. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Battle of the Birds, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, The Battle of the Birds, sentence 2

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There was once a farmer who was seeking a servant, and the wren met him and said: "What are you seeking?"

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**Who acts:** farmer, wren, you · **What happens:** be, seek, meet, say · **To what, where:** servant, farmer · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, The Battle of the Birds. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (farmer, wren, you), 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:pg7885:31:2
# text = There was once a farmer who was seeking a servant, and the wren met him and said: "What are you seeking?"
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	advcl	_	_
3	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	2	advmod	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	farmer	farmer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
6	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	8	nsubj	_	_
7	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
8	seeking	seek	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	5	acl:relcl	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	servant	servant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	wren	wren	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
15	met	meet	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	advcl	_	_
16	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
18	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	24	punct	_	_
20	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	24	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	24	obj	_	_
22	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
23	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
24	seeking	seek	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	18	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	24	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	24	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | a farmer |  |  | there |  | once *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **seek** | past · progressive | a farmer | a servant |  |  |  |  | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent servant=Theme |
| 3 | **meet** | past | the wren | farmer |  |  |  |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Co-Agent |
| 4 | **say** *speech: ask* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 5 | **seek** *in a quote* | present · progressive | you |  |  |  |  |  | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=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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