---
title: “What is the use of that?” thought Rikki-tikki. — The Jungle Book · tree and pragmatics
description: “What is the use of that?” thought Rikki-tikki. Who acts: use. A sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 14, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/14/18/)

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# The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, part 14, sentence 18

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“What is the use of that?” thought Rikki-tikki.

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**Who acts:** use · **What happens:** be, think · **To what, where:** use, Rikki · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 14. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (use), 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:pg236:14:18
# text = “What is the use of that?” thought Rikki-tikki.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	5	nsubj	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	use	use	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
10	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	Rikki	Rikki	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	tikki	tikki	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present |  | the use |  |  |  | of that | tree rules |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past | the use | Rikki |  |  |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot rikki=Theme |

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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:** «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, Project Gutenberg book 236 (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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