---
title: Then all the beasts, birds, and fishes said together, ‘Eldest Magici… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: Then all the beasts, birds, and fishes said together, ‘Eldest Magician, we play the plays that you taught us to play--we and our children’s children. Who acts: we, you, plays. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Crab That Played With the Sea, with its dependency tree and the prag
---

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# Just so stories, The Crab That Played With the Sea, sentence 44

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Then all the beasts, birds, and fishes said together, ‘Eldest Magician, we play the plays that you taught us to play--we and our children’s children.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** we, you, plays · **What happens:** say, play, teach · **To what, where:** fishes, plays, us, we · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Crab That Played With the Sea. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (we, you, plays), 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:pg2781:11:44
# text = Then all the beasts, birds, and fishes said together, ‘Eldest Magician, we play the plays that you taught us to play--we and our children’s children.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
2	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	4	det:predet	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	beasts	beast	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
6	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	fishes	fish	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	conj	_	_
10	said	say	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	9	acl	_	_
11	together	together	ADV	RB	_	10	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	Eldest	eld	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	15	amod	_	_
15	Magician	Magician	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
17	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	play	play	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	15	conj	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	plays	play	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	18	obj	_	_
21	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	23	obj	_	_
22	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	taught	teach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	acl:relcl	_	_
24	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	obj	_	_
25	to	to	PART	TO	_	26	mark	_	_
26	play	play	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	23	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	26	obj	_	_
29	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	33	cc	_	_
30	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	31	nmod:poss	_	_
31	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	33	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	’s	's	PART	POS	_	31	case	_	_
33	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
34	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | participle |  | fishes *not said here* |  |  |  | together *property* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **play** | present | we | the plays |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent play=Theme |
| 3 | **teach** *speech: other* | past | you | the plays | us |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **play** | to-infinitive | the plays *not said here* | we |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent we=Theme |

<!-- .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.

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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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