---
title: Had they been alone they could have gone twice as fast, but the boy’… — The Jungle Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Had they been alone they could have gone twice as fast, but the boy’s weight held them back. Who acts: Feet, weight. A sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, part 4, sentence 135

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Had they been alone they could have gone twice as fast, but the boy’s weight held them back.

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**Who acts:** Feet, weight · **What happens:** have, be, go, hold back · **To what, where:** Feet

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This is a sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Feet, weight), 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:pg236:4:135
# text = Had they been alone they could have gone twice as fast, but the boy’s weight held them back.
1	Had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	1	obj	_	_
3	been	be	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	8	advcl	_	_
4	alone	alone	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
5	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
6	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
7	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	aux	_	_
8	gone	go	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	1	conj	_	_
9	twice	twice	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	11	advmod	_	_
10	as	as	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	fast	fast	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	8	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
13	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	’s	's	PART	POS	_	15	case	_	_
17	weight	weight	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	_
18	held	hold	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	1	advcl	_	_
19	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	obj	_	_
20	back	back	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past |  | Feet *= foot* |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Patient |
| 2 | **be** | participle | Feet *= foot* *not said here* |  |  |  |  | alone *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **go** | could · perfect | Feet *= foot* |  |  |  |  | fast *property* | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **hold back** | past | the boy's weight | Feet *= foot* |  |  |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=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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