---
title: If they had lost their only son there would be no use in saying anyt… — The Happy Prince, and Other Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: If they had lost their only son there would be no use in saying anything more about the matter. Who acts: people, you, use. A sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 6, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Happy Prince, and Other Tales, Opening, part 6, sentence 74

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If they had lost their only son there would be no use in saying anything more about the matter.

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**Who acts:** people, you, use · **What happens:** lose, be, say · **To what, where:** only son, use, anything · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (people, you, use), 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:pg902:6:74
# text = If they had lost their only son there would be no use in saying anything more about the matter.
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	lost	lose	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	12	advcl	_	_
5	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
6	only	only	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
8	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	10	expl	_	_
9	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
10	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	cop	_	_
11	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	12	det	_	_
12	use	use	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
13	in	in	SCONJ	IN	_	14	mark	_	_
14	saying	say	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	12	acl	_	_
15	anything	anything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	14	obj	_	_
16	more	more	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	15	amod	_	_
17	about	about	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	matter	matter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **lose** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · perfect | people | people's only son |  |  |  |  | vn succeed-74-3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent son=Eventuality |
| 2 | **is a** | imperative | you *not said here* | no use |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | gerund | no use *not said here* | anything |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent anything=Topic |

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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:** «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.

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