---
title: The Wolf could not help thinking how nice it would be to have a fine… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: The Wolf could not help thinking how nice it would be to have a fine fat Dog to eat instead of the scrawny object before him. Who acts: Wolf. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Wolf and the Lean Dog, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Wolf and the Lean Dog, sentence 11

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The Wolf could not help thinking how nice it would be to have a fine fat Dog to eat instead of the scrawny object before him.

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**Who acts:** Wolf · **What happens:** not help, think, be, have, eat · **To what, where:** fine fat Dog

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Wolf and the Lean Dog. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Wolf), 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:pg19994:56:11
# text = The Wolf could not help thinking how nice it would be to have a fine fat Dog to eat instead of the scrawny object before him.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	Wolf	Wolf	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
3	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	thinking	think	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	5	xcomp	_	_
7	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	8	advmod	_	_
8	nice	nice	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	ccomp	_	_
9	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
10	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
11	be	be	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	_
12	to	to	PART	TO	_	13	mark	_	_
13	have	have	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	xcomp	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
15	fine	fine	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
16	fat	fat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	compound	_	_
17	Dog	dog	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	_
18	to	to	PART	TO	_	19	mark	_	_
19	eat	eat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	acl	_	_
20	instead	instead	ADV	RB	ExtPos=ADP	24	case	_	_
21	of	of	ADP	IN	_	20	fixed	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
23	scrawny	scrawny	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	amod	_	_
24	object	object	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
25	before	before	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
26	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **help** | could | the Wolf |  |  |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* *not said to happen* | gerund | the Wolf *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **be** | infinitive | the Wolf *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **have** | to-infinitive | the Wolf *not said here* | a fine fat Dog |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent dog=Patient |
| 5 | **eat** | to-infinitive | the Wolf *not said here* | a fine fat Dog *not said here* |  |  | before Wolf | instead the scrawny object | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=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:** «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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