---
title: The first thing he did was to assure himself that the fishing was go… — The Jungle Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The first thing he did was to assure himself that the fishing was good, and then he swam along the beaches and counted up the delightful low sandy islands half hidden in the beautiful rolling fog. Who acts: Kotick, first thing, fishing. A sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle 
---

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# The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, part 12, sentence 73

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The first thing he did was to assure himself that the fishing was good, and then he swam along the beaches and counted up the delightful low sandy islands half hidden in the beautiful rolling fog.

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**Who acts:** Kotick, first thing, fishing · **What happens:** do, be, swim, count up, hide, roll · **To what, where:** first thing, beaches, delightful low sandy islands, beautiful rolling fog

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This is a sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 12. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Kotick, first thing, fishing), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg236:1458`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg236:12:73
# text = The first thing he did was to assure himself that the fishing was good, and then he swam along the beaches and counted up the delightful low sandy islands half hidden in the beautiful rolling fog.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	first	first	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	3	amod	_	_
3	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	did	do	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	acl:relcl	_	_
6	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	cop	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	assure	assure	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
9	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	8	obj	_	_
10	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	14	mark	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	fishing	fishing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
13	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	cop	_	_
14	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	ccomp	_	_
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
17	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	19	advmod	_	_
18	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	swam	swim	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
20	along	along	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	beaches	beach	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	obl	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
24	counted	count	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	conj	_	_
25	up	up	ADP	RP	_	24	compound:prt	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
27	delightful	delightful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	30	amod	_	_
28	low	low	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	30	amod	_	_
29	sandy	sandy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	30	amod	_	_
30	islands	island	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	obj	_	_
31	half	half	ADV	RB	_	32	advmod	_	_
32	hidden	hide	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	30	acl	_	_
33	in	in	ADP	IN	_	37	case	_	_
34	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	37	det	_	_
35	beautiful	beautiful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	37	amod	_	_
36	rolling	roll	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	37	amod	_	_
37	fog	fog	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	obl	_	_
38	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **do** | past | Kotick | the first thing *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent thing=Eventuality |
| 2 | **is** | past | the first thing |  |  |  |  | assure *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** | past | the fishing |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **swim** | past | Kotick |  |  | the beaches | then |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme along beach=Trajectory |
| 5 | **count up** | past | Kotick *not said here* | the delightful low sandy islands |  |  |  |  | vn multiply-108 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent island=Theme |
| 6 | **hide** | participle |  | the delightful low sandy islands *not said here* |  | the beautiful rolling fog |  | half *property* | vn concealment-16-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent in fog=Location |
| 7 | **roll** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «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:** «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, Project Gutenberg book 236 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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