---
title: But the Cock expostulated in piteous tones from his perch: “If you k… — Three hundred Aesop’s fables · tree and pragmatics
description: But the Cock expostulated in piteous tones from his perch: “If you kill me, who will announce to you the appearance of the dawn? Who acts: Cock, you. 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.
---

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# Three hundred Aesop’s fables, Aesop’s Fables, part 6, sentence 108

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But the Cock expostulated in piteous tones from his perch: “If you kill me, who will announce to you the appearance of the dawn?

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**Who acts:** Cock, you · **What happens:** expostulate, kill, announce · **To what, where:** piteous tones, covey, appearance, you

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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 (Cock, you), 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:pg21:8:108
# text = But the Cock expostulated in piteous tones from his perch: “If you kill me, who will announce to you the appearance of the dawn?
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	Cock	Cock	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	expostulated	expostulate	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	in	in	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	piteous	piteous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	tones	tone	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl	_	_
8	from	from	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	perch	perch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	20	punct	_	_
12	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	20	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
14	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	kill	kill	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	20	advcl	_	_
16	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
18	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	20	nsubj	_	_
19	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
20	announce	announce	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	_
21	to	to	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	20	obl	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	appearance	appearance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obj	_	_
25	of	of	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	dawn	dawn	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **expostulate** | past | the Cock |  |  | piteous tones |  | from Cock's perch | tree rules |
| 2 | **kill** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | present | you | the covey *= covey* |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Theme |
| 3 | **announce** *speech: other* *in a quote* | future |  | the appearance of the dawn | you |  |  |  | vn reflexive\_appearance-48.1.2 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent appearance=Theme to you=Recipient |

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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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