---
title: He understood what the beasts said, what the birds said, what the fi… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: He understood what the beasts said, what the birds said, what the fishes said, and what the insects said. Who acts: Suleiman, beasts, birds, fishes. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Butterfly That Stamped, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Just so stories, The Butterfly That Stamped, sentence 8

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He understood what the beasts said, what the birds said, what the fishes said, and what the insects said.

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**Who acts:** Suleiman, beasts, birds, fishes, insects · **What happens:** understand, say · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Butterfly That Stamped. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Suleiman, beasts, birds, fishes), 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:pg2781:13:8
# text = He understood what the beasts said, what the birds said, what the fishes said, and what the insects said.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	understood	understand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	6	obj	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	beasts	beast	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nsubj	_	_
6	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	11	obj	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	nsubj	_	_
11	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	16	obj	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	fishes	fish	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj	_	_
16	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	16	ccomp	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	insects	insect	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	nsubj	_	_
22	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	19	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **understand** | past | Suleiman |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the beasts |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the birds |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent what=Topic |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the fishes |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent what=Topic |
| 5 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the insects |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: 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.

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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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