---
title: "My sons," he said, "heed what I have to say to you. — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: "My sons," he said, "heed what I have to say to you. Who acts: sons. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Farmer and His Sons, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Farmer and His Sons, sentence 2

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
"My sons," he said, "heed what I have to say to you.

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**Who acts:** sons · **What happens:** say, have · **To what, where:** heed, you · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Farmer and His Sons. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sons), 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:pg19994:80:2
# text = "My sons," he said, "heed what I have to say to you.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	My	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	sons	son	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	heed	heed	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
11	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	13	obj	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	have	have	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	7	ccomp	_	_
14	to	to	PART	TO	_	15	mark	_	_
15	say	say	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	xcomp	_	_
16	to	to	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | My sons | heed |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **have** *in a quote* | present | My sons *= son* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | to-infinitive | My sons *= son* *not said here* |  | you |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to you=Recipient |

<!-- .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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