---
title: But while they were debating how best to meet death, they thought th… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: But while they were debating how best to meet death, they thought they heard a noise and in a flash were scampering off to the warren. Who acts: Hares. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Hares and the Frogs, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Hares and the Frogs, sentence 4

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But while they were debating how best to meet death, they thought they heard a noise and in a flash were scampering off to the warren.

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**Who acts:** Hares · **What happens:** debate, meet, think, hear, scamper off · **To what, where:** best, death, noise, flash · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Hares and the Frogs. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Hares), 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:pg19994:49:4
# text = But while they were debating how best to meet death, they thought they heard a noise and in a flash were scampering off to the warren.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
2	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
3	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
4	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
5	debating	debate	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	13	advcl	_	_
6	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	7	advmod	_	_
7	best	good	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	5	obj	_	_
8	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
9	meet	meet	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	advcl	_	_
10	death	death	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
12	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
14	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	ccomp	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	noise	noise	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	flash	flash	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	_
22	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	aux	_	_
23	scampering	scamper	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	15	conj	_	_
24	off	off	ADP	RP	_	23	compound:prt	_	_
25	to	to	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	warren	warren	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	13	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **debate** | past · progressive | Hares *= hare* | best |  |  |  |  | vn battle-36.4-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent good=Co-Agent |
| 2 | **meet** | to-infinitive | Hares *= hare* *not said here* | death |  |  |  |  | vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent death=Co-Agent |
| 3 | **think** *speech: other* | past | Hares *= hare* |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 4 | **hear** | past | Hares *= hare* | a noise |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer noise=Stimulus |
| 5 | **scamper off** | past · progressive | Hares *= hare* *not said here* |  |  | a flash |  | to the warren | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme to warren=Destination |

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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 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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