---
title: He asked questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt,… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: He asked questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt, or smelt, or touched, and all his uncles and his aunts spanked him. Who acts: Elephant, uncles. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Elephant’s Child, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Just so stories, The Elephant’s Child, sentence 10

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He asked questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt, or smelt, or touched, and all his uncles and his aunts spanked him.

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**Who acts:** Elephant, uncles · **What happens:** ask, see, hear, feel, touch, spank · **To what, where:** questions, smelt, Elephant · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Elephant’s Child. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Elephant, uncles), 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:pg2781:6:10
# text = He asked questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt, or smelt, or touched, and all his uncles and his aunts spanked him.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	questions	question	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	obj	_	_
4	about	about	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	everything	everything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Tot	3	nmod	_	_
6	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
10	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
11	heard	hear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	8	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
13	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	felt	feel	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	smelt	smelt	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	touched	touch	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	14	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	29	punct	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	29	cc	_	_
23	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	25	det:predet	_	_
24	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	25	nmod:poss	_	_
25	uncles	uncle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	29	nsubj	_	_
26	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
27	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	28	nmod:poss	_	_
28	aunts	aunt	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	conj	_	_
29	spanked	spank	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
30	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	29	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | Elephant | questions |  |  |  | about everything | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP whether S»: agent=Agent question=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 2 | **see** | past | Elephant |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **hear** | participle | Elephant *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V PP.stimulus»: agent=Experiencer |
| 4 | **feel** | past |  | smelt |  |  |  |  | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus |
| 5 | **touch** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn contiguous\_location-47.8-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 6 | **spank** | past | Elephant's uncles and Elephant's aunts | Elephant |  |  |  |  | vn spank-18.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Patient |

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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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