---
title: No one would think of biting such a little thing, except a coward li… — The Wonderful Wizard of Oz · tree and pragmatics
description: No one would think of biting such a little thing, except a coward like me,” continued the Lion sadly. Who acts: one, coward. A sentence of «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Chapter VI. The Cowardly Lion, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg55/8/43/)

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# The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chapter VI. The Cowardly Lion, sentence 43

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No one would think of biting such a little thing, except a coward like me,” continued the Lion sadly.

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**Who acts:** one, coward · **What happens:** think, bite, continue · **To what, where:** little thing, Lion · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Chapter VI. The Cowardly Lion. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (one, coward), 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:pg55:8:43
# text = No one would think of biting such a little thing, except a coward like me,” continued the Lion sadly.
1	No	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	2	det	_	_
2	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	think	think	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
6	biting	bite	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	advcl	_	_
7	such	such	DET	PDT	PronType=Ind	10	det:predet	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
12	except	except	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	coward	coward	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	_
15	like	like	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	14	punct	_	_
19	continued	continue	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	Lion	Lion	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	_
22	sadly	sadly	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **think** *speech: other* | would | no one |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 2 | **bite** | gerund | no one *not said here* | such little thing |  |  |  |  | vn swat-18.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent thing=Patient |
| 3 | **continue** *in a quote* | past | a coward like me | the Lion |  |  |  | sadly *property* | vn sustain-55.6 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent lion=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:** «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Project Gutenberg book 55 (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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