---
title: ‘To-las means that there’s no water in the tank for Mummy to cook wi… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘To-las means that there’s no water in the tank for Mummy to cook with--just when I’m going hunting, too.’ Who acts: las, I. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the Alphabet Was Made, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Just so stories, How the Alphabet Was Made, sentence 233

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‘To-las means that there’s no water in the tank for Mummy to cook with--just when I’m going hunting, too.’

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**Who acts:** las, I · **What happens:** mean, cook, be, go · **To what, where:** hunting

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This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the Alphabet Was Made. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (las, I), 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:pg2781:10:233
# text = ‘To-las means that there’s no water in the tank for Mummy to cook with--just when I’m going hunting, too.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	To	to	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	las	la	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nsubj	_	_
5	means	mean	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	8	expl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	’s	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	ccomp	_	_
9	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	10	det	_	_
10	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	tank	tank	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	_
14	for	for	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	Mummy	Mummy	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	13	nmod	_	_
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	cook	cook	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	advcl	_	_
18	with	with	ADP	IN	_	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	just	just	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	_
21	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	23	advmod	_	_
22	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	’m	be	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	_
24	going	go	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	23	xcomp	_	_
25	hunting	hunting	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
27	too	too	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **mean** | present | las |  |  |  |  |  | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **cook** | to-infinitive | las *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn cooking-45.3 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 3 | **be** | present | I |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **go** | gerund | I *not said here* | hunting |  |  |  |  | vn meander-47.7 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location hunting=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:** «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, Project Gutenberg book 2781 (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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