---
title: But in the midst of his song, his driver guessed what the Ass had go… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: But in the midst of his song, his driver guessed what the Ass had got into his head, and began to beat him unmercifully with a stick. Who acts: driver, Ass. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Ass Carrying the Image, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Ass Carrying the Image, sentence 5

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But in the midst of his song, his driver guessed what the Ass had got into his head, and began to beat him unmercifully with a stick.

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**Who acts:** driver, Ass · **What happens:** guess, get, begin, beat, sing · **To what, where:** midst, head, Ass

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Ass Carrying the Image. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (driver, Ass), 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:pg19994:35:5
# text = But in the midst of his song, his driver guessed what the Ass had got into his head, and began to beat him unmercifully with a stick.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
2	in	in	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	midst	midst	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
7	song	song	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
9	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	driver	driver	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
11	guessed	guess	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	11	obj	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	Ass	Ass	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
15	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	got	get	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	12	acl:relcl	_	_
17	into	into	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	22	cc	_	_
22	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	conj	_	_
23	to	to	PART	TO	_	24	mark	_	_
24	beat	beat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	xcomp	_	_
25	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	24	obj	_	_
26	unmercifully	unmercifully	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
27	with	with	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	stick	stick	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **guess** | past | Ass's driver |  |  | the midst of Ass's song |  |  | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Theme |
| 2 | **get** | past · perfect | the Ass |  |  | Ass's head |  |  | vn escape-51.1 «NP V PP.destination»: agent=Theme into head=Destination |
| 3 | **begin** | past | Ass's driver *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 4 | **beat** | to-infinitive | Ass's driver *not said here* | Ass |  |  |  | with a stick; unmercifully *property* | vn hit-18.1-1 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent he=Patient with stick=Instrument |
| 5 | **sing** |  | Ass |  |  |  |  |  | nom song «communication intransitive»: 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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