---
title: While the Sparrow was thus speaking, a hawk suddenly seized him and… — Three hundred Aesop’s fables · tree and pragmatics
description: While the Sparrow was thus speaking, a hawk suddenly seized him and killed him. Who acts: Sparrow, hawk. A sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 12, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Three hundred Aesop’s fables, Aesop’s Fables, part 12, sentence 35

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While the Sparrow was thus speaking, a hawk suddenly seized him and killed him.

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**Who acts:** Sparrow, hawk · **What happens:** speak, seize, kill · **To what, where:** foot · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 12. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Sparrow, hawk), 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:pg21:14:35
# text = While the Sparrow was thus speaking, a hawk suddenly seized him and killed him.
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	Sparrow	Sparrow	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
5	thus	thus	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	speaking	speak	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	hawk	hawk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
10	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	seized	seize	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	obj	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	killed	kill	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	conj	_	_
15	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **speak** *speech: other* | past · progressive | the Sparrow |  |  |  |  | thus *property* | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **seize** | past | a hawk | foot |  |  |  | suddenly *property* | vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Theme |
| 3 | **kill** | past | a hawk *not said here* | foot |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Theme |

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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:** «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Project Gutenberg book 21 (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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