---
title: If there were but ten of us we might pull him down as he lies. — The Jungle Book · tree and pragmatics
description: If there were but ten of us we might pull him down as he lies. Who acts: ten, we, Mowgli. A sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 8, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/8/112/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Jungle Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/) / [The Jungle Book, part 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/8/) / 112

# The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, part 8, sentence 112

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
If there were but ten of us we might pull him down as he lies.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** ten, we, Mowgli · **What happens:** be, pull down, lie · **To what, where:** Mowgli

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Jungle Book» by Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book, part 8. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (ten, we, Mowgli), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg236:8:112
# text = If there were but ten of us we might pull him down as he lies.
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	3	expl	_	_
3	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	advcl	_	_
4	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
5	ten	ten	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	3	nsubj	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nmod	_	_
8	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
9	might	might	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
10	pull	pull	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
11	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	obj	_	_
12	down	down	ADP	RP	_	10	compound:prt	_	_
13	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	lies	lie	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | ten of us |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **pull down** | might | we | Mowgli |  |  |  |  | vn push-12-1 «NP V NP ADJP-Result»: agent=Agent he=Result |
| 3 | **lie** | present | Mowgli |  |  |  |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 111](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/8/111/)
- next →: [sentence 113](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/8/113/)
- ↑ back to [The Jungle Book, part 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg236/8/)