---
title: "What are you trying to give us now?" inquired one of the young men,… — Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings · tree and pragmatics
description: "What are you trying to give us now?" inquired one of the young men, in a bilious tone. Who acts: you, trying. A sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, VIII. Race Improvement, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings, VIII. Race Improvement, sentence 4

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"What are you trying to give us now?" inquired one of the young men, in a bilious tone.

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**Who acts:** you, trying · **What happens:** try, give, inquire · **To what, where:** us, one, bilious tone · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, VIII. Race Improvement. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, trying), 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:pg2306:54:4
# text = "What are you trying to give us now?" inquired one of the young men, in a bilious tone.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	5	obj	_	_
3	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	trying	try	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	12	csubj	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	give	give	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	xcomp	_	_
8	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	7	iobj	_	_
9	now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	7	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
12	inquired	inquire	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	obj	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
16	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
21	bilious	bilious	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	tone	tone	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **try** *in a quote* | present · progressive | you |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **give** *not said to happen, in a quote* | to-infinitive | you *not said here* |  | us |  | now |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent we=Theme |
| 3 | **inquire** *speech: other* | past | trying | one of the young men |  | a bilious tone |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent one=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:** «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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