Just so stories, The Elephant’s Child, sentence 83

When the flies bit him he broke off the branch of a tree and used it as fly-whisk; and he made himself a new, cool, slushy-squshy mud-cap whenever the sun was hot.

Who acts: flies, Child, sun · What happens: bite, break off, use, make, be · To what, where: Child, branch

This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Elephant’s Child. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (flies, Child, sun), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	When	when	ADV	PronType=Int	4 bit	advmod
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 flies	det
3	flies	fly	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 bit	nsubj
4	bit	bite	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 broke	advcl
5	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 bit	obj
6	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 broke	nsubj
7	broke	break	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
8	off	off	ADP	_	10 branch	case
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 branch	det
10	branch	branch	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 broke	obl
11	of	of	ADP	_	13 tree	case
12	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	13 tree	det
13	tree	tree	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 branch	nmod
14	and	and	CCONJ	_	15 used	cc
15	used	use	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 broke	conj
16	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	15 used	obj
17	as	as	ADP	_	20 whisk	case
18	fly	fly	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 whisk	compound
19	-	-	PUNCT	_	18 fly	punct
20	whisk	whisk	NOUN	Number=Sing	15 used	obl
21	;	;	PUNCT	_	24 made	punct
22	and	and	CCONJ	_	24 made	cc
23	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	24 made	nsubj
24	made	make	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 broke	conj
25	himself	himself	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs Reflex=Yes	24 made	obj
26	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	36 cap	det
27	new	new	ADJ	Degree=Pos	36 cap	amod
28	,	,	PUNCT	_	29 cool	punct
29	cool	cool	ADJ	Degree=Pos	27 new	conj
30	,	,	PUNCT	_	27 new	punct
31	slushy	slushy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	33 squshy	amod
32	-	-	PUNCT	_	31 slushy	punct
33	squshy	squshy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	36 cap	amod
34	mud	mud	NOUN	Number=Sing	36 cap	compound
35	-	-	PUNCT	_	34 mud	punct
36	cap	cap	NOUN	Number=Sing	24 made	obj
37	whenever	whenever	ADV	PronType=Rel	41 hot	advmod
38	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	39 sun	det
39	sun	sun	NOUN	Number=Sing	41 hot	nsubj
40	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	41 hot	cop
41	hot	hot	ADJ	Degree=Pos	24 made	xcomp
42	.	.	PUNCT	_	7 broke	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	bite	past	the flies	Child		vn swat-18.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Patient
2	break off	past	Child	the branch of a tree		vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer branch=Patient
3	use	past	Child not said here	branch	as fly whisk	vn spend_time-104 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Agent it=Duration as whisk=Attribute
4	make	past	Child	Child		vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP NP»: agent=Asset himself=Beneficiary cap=Product
5	is	past	the sun		hot, whenever property	tree rules

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.

Text: «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, Project Gutenberg book 2781 (public domain in the USA). Tree: Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/6/83/