---
title: And the Leopard scratched his head and said, ‘It ought to be ‘sclusi… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: And the Leopard scratched his head and said, ‘It ought to be ‘sclusively a delicate greyish-fawn, and it ought to be Zebra; but it is covered all over with black and purple stripes. Who acts: Leopard, head. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the Leopard Got His Spots, with its d
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/5/54/)

<!-- 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 Leopard Got His Spots](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/5/) / 54

# Just so stories, How the Leopard Got His Spots, sentence 54

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
And the Leopard scratched his head and said, ‘It ought to be ‘sclusively a delicate greyish-fawn, and it ought to be Zebra; but it is covered all over with black and purple stripes.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Leopard, head · **What happens:** scratch, say, be, cover · **To what, where:** head, delicate greyish fawn, Zebra · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (Leopard, head), 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:pg2781:5:54
# text = And the Leopard scratched his head and said, ‘It ought to be ‘sclusively a delicate greyish-fawn, and it ought to be Zebra; but it is covered all over with black and purple stripes.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	Leopard	Leopard	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	scratched	scratch	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	ought	ought	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	8	ccomp	_	_
13	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
14	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	cop	_	_
15	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	sclusively	sclusively	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
18	delicate	delicate	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	_
19	greyish	greyish	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	fawn	fawn	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
24	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
25	ought	ought	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
26	to	to	PART	TO	_	28	mark	_	_
27	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	cop	_	_
28	Zebra	Zebra	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	33	punct	_	_
30	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	33	cc	_	_
31	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	33	nsubj:pass	_	_
32	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	33	aux:pass	_	_
33	covered	cover	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	conj	_	_
34	all	all	ADV	RB	_	35	advmod	_	_
35	over	over	ADV	RB	_	33	advmod	_	_
36	with	with	ADP	IN	_	40	case	_	_
37	black	black	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	40	amod	_	_
38	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	39	cc	_	_
39	purple	purple	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	37	conj	_	_
40	stripes	stripe	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	33	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
41	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **scratch** | past | the Leopard | Brother's head |  |  |  |  | vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent head=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the Leopard *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is a** | to-infinitive | the Leopard *not said here* | a delicate greyish fawn |  |  |  | sclusively *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **is a** | ought | head | Zebra |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **cover** | present · passive |  | head |  |  |  | with black stripes; over *property* | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: subject=Destination with stripe=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.

<!-- 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 53](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/5/53/)
- next →: [sentence 55](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/5/55/)
- ↑ back to [How the Leopard Got His Spots](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2781/5/)