---
title: "'Did he kill the Frog, Uncle Remus?" asked the little boy, as the o… — Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings · tree and pragmatics
description: "'Did he kill the Frog, Uncle Remus?" asked the little boy, as the old man paused to scoop up a thimbleful of glowing embers in his pipe. Who acts: en, little boy, old man. A sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XXIV. Mr. Bear Catches Old Mr. Bull-frog, with 
---

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# Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings, XXIV. Mr. Bear Catches Old Mr. Bull-frog, sentence 52

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"'Did he kill the Frog, Uncle Remus?" asked the little boy, as the old man paused to scoop up a thimbleful of glowing embers in his pipe.

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**Who acts:** en, little boy, old man · **What happens:** kill, ask, pause, scoop up, glow · **To what, where:** Frog, thimbleful, pipe · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XXIV. Mr. Bear Catches Old Mr. Bull-frog. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (en, little boy, old man), 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:pg2306:27:52
# text = "'Did he kill the Frog, Uncle Remus?" asked the little boy, as the old man paused to scoop up a thimbleful of glowing embers in his pipe.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	Did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	kill	kill	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	ccomp	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	Frog	Frog	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	Uncle	Uncle	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	compound	_	_
10	Remus	Remus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
13	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
18	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	22	mark	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
20	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	_
21	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	nsubj	_	_
22	paused	pause	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	conj	_	_
23	to	to	PART	TO	_	24	mark	_	_
24	scoop	scoop	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	xcomp	_	_
25	up	up	ADP	RP	_	24	compound:prt	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	thimbleful	thimbleful	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obj	_	_
28	of	of	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	glowing	glow	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	30	amod	_	_
30	embers	ember	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	27	nmod	_	_
31	in	in	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
32	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	33	nmod:poss	_	_
33	pipe	pipe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	13	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **kill** *in a quote* | past · do-support | en | the Frog and Uncle Remus |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent frog=Theme |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | the little boy |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **pause** | past | the old man |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **scoop up** | to-infinitive | the old man *not said here* | a thimbleful of glowing embers |  | en's pipe |  |  | vn funnel-9.3 «NP V NP PP.trajectory»: agent=Agent thimbleful=Theme in pipe=Trajectory |
| 5 | **glow** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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:** «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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