---
title: So he told his story to the Malee’s wife, and begged her to help him. — The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient · tree and pragmatics
description: So he told his story to the Malee’s wife, and begged her to help him. Who acts: Prince. A sentence of «The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient» by Penrhyn Wingfield Coussens, Opening, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg65965/4/20/)

<!-- 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/) / [The Jade Story Book; Stories from the…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg65965/) / [Opening, part 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg65965/4/) / 20

# The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient, Opening, part 4, sentence 20

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
So he told his story to the Malee’s wife, and begged her to help him.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Prince · **What happens:** tell, beg, help · **To what, where:** story, wife, Prince · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient» by Penrhyn Wingfield Coussens, Opening, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Prince), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg65965:4:20
# text = So he told his story to the Malee’s wife, and begged her to help him.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	to	to	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	Malee	Malee	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’s	's	PART	POS	_	8	case	_	_
10	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	begged	beg	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
14	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obj	_	_
15	to	to	PART	TO	_	16	mark	_	_
16	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	advcl	_	_
17	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | Prince | Prince's story | the Malee's wife |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent story=Topic to wife=Recipient |
| 2 | **beg** *speech: request* | past | Prince *not said here* |  | wife |  |  |  | vn beg-58.2-1-1 «NP V NP PP.Topic»: agent=Agent she=Recipient |
| 3 | **help** | to-infinitive | Prince *not said here* |  | Prince |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Beneficiary |

<!-- .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:** «The Jade Story Book; Stories from the Orient» by Penrhyn Wingfield Coussens, Project Gutenberg book 65965 (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 19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg65965/4/19/)
- next →: [sentence 21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg65965/4/21/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg65965/4/)