---
title: They were all there, prancing and shouting, and they frightened ever… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: They were all there, prancing and shouting, and they frightened every fish for twenty miles, and Tegumai thanked them in a fluid Neolithic oration. Who acts: legs, Tegumai. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the First Letter Was Written, with its dependency tree and the pragmati
---

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# Just so stories, How the First Letter Was Written, sentence 128

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They were all there, prancing and shouting, and they frightened every fish for twenty miles, and Tegumai thanked them in a fluid Neolithic oration.

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**Who acts:** legs, Tegumai · **What happens:** be, prance, shout, frighten, thank · **To what, where:** fish, legs, fluid Neolithic oration

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This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, How the First Letter Was Written. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (legs, Tegumai), 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:pg2781:9:128
# text = They were all there, prancing and shouting, and they frightened every fish for twenty miles, and Tegumai thanked them in a fluid Neolithic oration.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
3	all	all	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
6	prancing	prance	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	advcl	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	shouting	shout	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
11	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	frightened	frighten	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
13	every	every	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	14	det	_	_
14	fish	fish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
15	for	for	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	twenty	twenty	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	17	nummod	_	_
17	miles	mile	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
20	Tegumai	Tegumai	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
21	thanked	thank	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
22	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obj	_	_
23	in	in	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
25	fluid	fluid	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	compound	_	_
26	Neolithic	neolithic	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	amod	_	_
27	oration	oration	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | legs *= leg* |  |  |  |  | all, there *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **prance** | gerund | legs *= leg* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **shout** *speech: express* | gerund | legs *= leg* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **frighten** | past | legs *= leg* | every fish |  |  |  | for twenty miles | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus fish=Experiencer |
| 5 | **thank** *speech: thank* | past | Tegumai |  | legs *= leg* | a fluid Neolithic oration |  |  | vn judgment-33.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |

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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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