---
title: He was engaged in searching among some scraps of leather under his c… — Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings · tree and pragmatics
description: He was engaged in searching among some scraps of leather under his chair, and kept on talking to the imaginary person. A sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XX. How Mr. Rabbit Saved His Meat, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings, XX. How Mr. Rabbit Saved His Meat, sentence 14

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He was engaged in searching among some scraps of leather under his chair, and kept on talking to the imaginary person.

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**What happens:** engage, keep, talk · **To what, where:** man, searching

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This is a sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XX. How Mr. Rabbit Saved His Meat. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg2306:23:14
# text = He was engaged in searching among some scraps of leather under his chair, and kept on talking to the imaginary person.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux:pass	_	_
3	engaged	engage	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	in	in	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	searching	searching	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
6	among	among	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	some	some	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	8	det	_	_
8	scraps	scrap	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	leather	leather	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	_
11	under	under	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	chair	chair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	kept	keep	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	parataxis	_	_
17	on	on	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
18	talking	talk	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	16	advcl	_	_
19	to	to	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
21	imaginary	imaginary	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	person	person	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **engage** | past · passive |  | man |  |  |  | in searching *goal*; among some scraps of leather; under man's chair | vn involve-107.1 «NP V NP PP.goal»: subject=Theme in searching=Goal |
| 2 | **keep** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **talk** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | to the imaginary person | vn talk-37.5 «NP V PP.co-agent»: agent=Agent to person=Co-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:** «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, Project Gutenberg book 2306 (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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