---
title: But, to tell you the truth, I am only his poor shepherd, and I have… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: But, to tell you the truth, I am only his poor shepherd, and I have come to beg your pardon for him and for me." Who acts: I, your. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, II. the Three Answers., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, II. the Three Answers., sentence 42

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But, to tell you the truth, I am only his poor shepherd, and I have come to beg your pardon for him and for me."

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**Who acts:** I, your · **What happens:** tell, be, come, beg, pardon · **To what, where:** truth, you, poor shepherd, pardon · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, II. the Three Answers.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, your), 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:pg18442:10:42
# text = But, to tell you the truth, I am only his poor shepherd, and I have come to beg your pardon for him and for me."
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
3	to	to	PART	TO	_	4	mark	_	_
4	tell	tell	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	4	iobj	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	truth	truth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
9	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
10	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	14	cop	_	_
11	only	only	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
12	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
13	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	shepherd	shepherd	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
17	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
18	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
19	come	come	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	4	ccomp	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	beg	beg	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	xcomp	_	_
22	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	nmod:poss	_	_
23	pardon	pardon	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	_
24	for	for	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obl	_	_
26	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
27	for	for	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
28	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	25	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | to-infinitive |  | the truth | you |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **is a** | present | I | abbot's poor shepherd |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **come** | present · perfect | I |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **beg** *speech: request* | to-infinitive | I *not said here* | your pardon |  |  |  | for abbot | vn beg-58.2-1-1 «NP V NP PP.Topic»: agent=Agent pardon=Recipient for he=Topic |
| 5 | **pardon** |  | your |  |  |  |  |  | nom pardon «act transitive»: poss=agent |

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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:** «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 18442 (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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