---
title: They were standing head to head, or walking to and fro across the gr… — The Jungle Book · tree and pragmatics
description: They were standing head to head, or walking to and fro across the ground in couples, or rocking and swaying all by themselves--scores and scores of elephants. Who acts: elephants. A sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 17, with its dependency tree and the pragmatic
---

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# The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, part 17, sentence 64

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They were standing head to head, or walking to and fro across the ground in couples, or rocking and swaying all by themselves--scores and scores of elephants.

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**Who acts:** elephants · **What happens:** stand, walk, fro, rock, sway, score · **To what, where:** head, ground, elephants

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This is a sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 17. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (elephants), 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:pg236:17:64
# text = They were standing head to head, or walking to and fro across the ground in couples, or rocking and swaying all by themselves--scores and scores of elephants.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	standing	stand	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
4	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
5	to	to	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
8	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	walking	walk	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	3	conj	_	_
10	to	to	ADP	IN	_	9	obl	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	fro	fro	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	conj	_	_
13	across	across	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	ground	ground	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	couples	couple	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	rocking	rock	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	3	conj	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	22	cc	_	_
22	swaying	sway	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	3	conj	_	_
23	all	all	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
24	by	by	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	scores	score	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	_
28	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	29	cc	_	_
29	scores	score	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	27	conj	_	_
30	of	of	ADP	IN	_	31	case	_	_
31	elephants	elephant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	29	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **stand** | past · progressive | elephants *= elephant* | head |  |  |  | to head; scores and scores of elephants *obl* | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer head=Stimulus |
| 2 | **walk** | gerund | elephants *= elephant* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **fro** | infinitive | elephants *= elephant* *not said here* |  |  | the ground |  | in couples | tree rules |
| 4 | **rock** | gerund | elephants *= elephant* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn modes\_of\_being\_with\_motion-47.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **sway** | gerund | elephants *= elephant* *not said here* |  |  |  |  | by elephants *= elephant*; all *property* | vn modes\_of\_being\_with\_motion-47.3 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme by themselves=Location |
| 6 | **score** |  |  | elephants |  |  |  |  | nom score «cognition transitive»: of=patient |

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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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