---
title: Let’s say things to the bunnies, and watch ‘em skitter their tails! — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: Let’s say things to the bunnies, and watch ‘em skitter their tails! Who acts: you, ’s, em. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the Leopard Got His Spots, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Just so stories, How the Leopard Got His Spots, sentence 129

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Let’s say things to the bunnies, and watch ‘em skitter their tails!

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**Who acts:** you, ’s, em · **What happens:** let, say, watch, skitter · **To what, where:** ’s, things, bunnies, tails · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the Leopard Got His Spots. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, ’s, em), 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:pg2781:5:129
# text = Let’s say things to the bunnies, and watch ‘em skitter their tails!
1	Let	let	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	’s	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	1	obj	_	_
3	say	say	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	1	xcomp	_	_
4	things	thing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obj	_	_
5	to	to	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	bunnies	bunny	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	watch	watch	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	1	parataxis	_	_
11	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	em	em	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
13	skitter	skitter	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	conj	_	_
14	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	tails	tail	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **let** | imperative | you *not said here* | ’s |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | infinitive | ’s *not said here* | things | the bunnies |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent thing=Topic to bunny=Recipient |
| 3 | **watch** | infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn search-35.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **skitter** | present | em | bunnies's tails |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent tail=Agent |

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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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