---
title: Just then the Cat let go his hold, and before the Mice recovered fro… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: Just then the Cat let go his hold, and before the Mice recovered from their surprise, he had made an end of three or four. Who acts: Cat, Mice, ropes. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Cat and the Old Rat, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Cat and the Old Rat, sentence 8

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Just then the Cat let go his hold, and before the Mice recovered from their surprise, he had made an end of three or four.

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**Who acts:** Cat, Mice, ropes · **What happens:** let, go, recover, make, hold, surprise · **To what, where:** hold, surprise, end

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Cat and the Old Rat. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Cat, Mice, ropes), 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:pg19994:131:8
# text = Just then the Cat let go his hold, and before the Mice recovered from their surprise, he had made an end of three or four.
1	Just	just	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
2	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	5	advmod	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	Cat	cat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	let	let	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	xcomp	_	_
7	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	8	nmod:poss	_	_
8	hold	hold	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
11	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	14	mark	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	Mice	mouse	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	nsubj	_	_
14	recovered	recover	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
15	from	from	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	surprise	surprise	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
19	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
20	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	made	make	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	5	parataxis	_	_
22	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	end	end	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	23	nmod	_	_
26	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
27	four	four	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	25	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **let** | past | the Cat |  |  |  | then |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **go** | infinitive | the Cat *not said here* | Cat's hold |  |  |  |  | vn meander-47.7 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location hold=Theme |
| 3 | **recover** | past | the Mice |  |  | ropes's surprise |  |  | vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP PP.source»: agent=Agent from surprise=Source |
| 4 | **make** | past · perfect | Cat | a end of three |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent end=Product |
| 5 | **hold** |  | Cat |  |  |  |  |  | nom hold «act transitive»: poss=agent |
| 6 | **surprise** |  | ropes *= rope* |  |  |  |  |  | nom surprise «feeling transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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.

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**Text:** «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, Project Gutenberg book 19994 (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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