---
title: If I’d only thought of that instead of drawing silly beaver pictures… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: If I’d only thought of that instead of drawing silly beaver pictures for the Stranger!’ Who acts: 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.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/10/235/)

<!-- 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/) / [Just so stories](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/) / [How the Alphabet Was Made](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/10/) / 235

# Just so stories, How the Alphabet Was Made, sentence 235

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
If I’d only thought of that instead of drawing silly beaver pictures for the Stranger!’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** think, draw · **To what, where:** silly beaver pictures

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (I), 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:pg2781:10:235
# text = If I’d only thought of that instead of drawing silly beaver pictures for the Stranger!’
1	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	’d	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	only	only	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	thought	think	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	obl	_	_
8	instead	instead	ADV	RB	ExtPos=SCONJ	10	mark	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	8	fixed	_	_
10	drawing	draw	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	5	advcl	_	_
11	silly	silly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
12	beaver	beaver	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	_
13	pictures	picture	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obj	_	_
14	for	for	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	Stranger	stranger	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **think** *speech: other* | past · perfect | I |  |  |  |  | of that | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **draw** | gerund | I *not said here* | silly beaver pictures |  |  |  | for the Stranger | vn create-26.4-1-1 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent picture=Result for stranger=Beneficiary |

<!-- .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:** «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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 234](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/10/234/)
- next →: [sentence 236](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/10/236/)
- ↑ back to [How the Alphabet Was Made](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/10/)