---
title: For the ways of elephants are beyond the wit of any man, black or wh… — The Jungle Book · tree and pragmatics
description: For the ways of elephants are beyond the wit of any man, black or white, to fathom. A sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 18, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, part 18, sentence 29

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For the ways of elephants are beyond the wit of any man, black or white, to fathom.

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**What happens:** be, fathom

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This is a sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 18. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg236:18:29
# text = For the ways of elephants are beyond the wit of any man, black or white, to fathom.
1	For	for	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	ways	way	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obl	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	elephants	elephant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nmod	_	_
6	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
7	beyond	beyond	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	wit	wit	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	any	any	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	12	det	_	_
12	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
14	black	black	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	parataxis	_	_
15	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	to	to	PART	TO	_	19	mark	_	_
19	fathom	fathom	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present |  |  |  |  |  | beyond the wit; for the ways of elephants; of any man | tree rules |
| 2 | **fathom** | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer |

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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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