---
title: They used to wander round the high wall when their lessons were over… — The Happy Prince, and Other Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: They used to wander round the high wall when their lessons were over, and talk about the beautiful garden inside. Who acts: children, lessons. A sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/3/63/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Happy Prince, and Other Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/) / [Opening, part 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/3/) / 63

# The Happy Prince, and Other Tales, Opening, part 3, sentence 63

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They used to wander round the high wall when their lessons were over, and talk about the beautiful garden inside.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** children, lessons · **What happens:** use, wander, be, talk · **To what, where:** high wall

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (children, lessons), 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:pg902:3:63
# text = They used to wander round the high wall when their lessons were over, and talk about the beautiful garden inside.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	used	use	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	to	to	PART	TO	_	4	mark	_	_
4	wander	wander	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	xcomp	_	_
5	round	round	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	high	high	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	wall	wall	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
9	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	13	advmod	_	_
10	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	lessons	lesson	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
12	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	cop	_	_
13	over	over	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	talk	talk	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	_
17	about	about	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	beautiful	beautiful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	garden	garden	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	_
21	inside	inside	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **use** | past | children *= child* |  |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **wander** | to-infinitive | children *= child* *not said here* |  |  | the high wall |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme round wall=Trajectory |
| 3 | **is** | past | children's lessons |  |  |  |  | over *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **talk** | infinitive | children *= child* *not said here* |  |  |  |  | about the beautiful garden | vn talk-37.5 «NP V PP.topic»: agent=Agent about garden=Topic |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Project Gutenberg book 902 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 62](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/3/62/)
- next →: [sentence 64](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/3/64/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/3/)