---
title: The Birdcatcher spared his life, and determined to pick out a fine y… — Three hundred Aesop’s fables · tree and pragmatics
description: The Birdcatcher spared his life, and determined to pick out a fine young Cock just attaining to his comb. Who acts: Birdcatcher, fine young Cock. A sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 6, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg21/8/107/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Three hundred Aesop’s fables](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg21/) / [Aesop’s Fables, part 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg21/8/) / 107

# Three hundred Aesop’s fables, Aesop’s Fables, part 6, sentence 107

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The Birdcatcher spared his life, and determined to pick out a fine young Cock just attaining to his comb.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Birdcatcher, fine young Cock · **What happens:** spare, pick out, attain · **To what, where:** life, fine young Cock

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Birdcatcher, fine young Cock), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg21:8:107
# text = The Birdcatcher spared his life, and determined to pick out a fine young Cock just attaining to his comb.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	Birdcatcher	Birdcatcher	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	spared	spare	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	determined	determined	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	conj	_	_
9	to	to	PART	TO	_	10	mark	_	_
10	pick	pick	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	_
11	out	out	ADP	RP	_	10	compound:prt	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
13	fine	fine	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
14	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	Cock	cock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
16	just	just	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
17	attaining	attain	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	15	acl	_	_
18	to	to	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	comb	comb	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **spare** | past | the Birdcatcher | bird's life |  |  |  |  | vn bill-54.5 «NP V NP NP.asset»: agent=Agent life=Asset |
| 2 | **pick out** | to-infinitive | the Birdcatcher *not said here* | a fine young Cock |  |  |  |  | vn chew-39.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent cock=Patient |
| 3 | **attain** | gerund | a fine young Cock *not said here* |  |  |  |  | to bird's comb | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 106](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg21/8/106/)
- next →: [sentence 108](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg21/8/108/)
- ↑ back to [Aesop’s Fables, part 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg21/8/)