---
title: The alligators agreed to this, and told the iguana to bring his cano… — Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria · tree and pragmatics
description: The alligators agreed to this, and told the iguana to bring his canoe and paddle the hare across the river. Who acts: alligators. A sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxii.--a Story of the Great Famine., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every 
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/16/41/)

<!-- 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/) / [Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/) / [Xxii.--a Story of the Great Famine.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/16/) / 41

# Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxii.--a Story of the Great Famine., sentence 41

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The alligators agreed to this, and told the iguana to bring his canoe and paddle the hare across the river.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** alligators · **What happens:** agree, tell, bring, paddle · **To what, where:** iguana, canoe, hare, river · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxii.--a Story of the Great Famine.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (alligators), 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:pg70959:16:41
# text = The alligators agreed to this, and told the iguana to bring his canoe and paddle the hare across the river.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	alligators	alligator	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	agreed	agree	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	iguana	iguana	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	iobj	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	bring	bring	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	_
13	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	canoe	canoe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	paddle	paddle	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	conj	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	hare	hare	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	_
19	across	across	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	river	river	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **agree** *speech: agree* | past | the alligators |  |  |  |  | to this | vn correspond-36.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | the alligators *not said here* |  | the iguana |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent iguana=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **bring** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | the alligators *not said here* | painting's canoe |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3-1 «NP V NP together»: agent=Agent canoe=Theme |
| 4 | **paddle** | infinitive | the alligators *not said here* | the hare |  | the river |  |  | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent hare=Theme across river=Trajectory |

<!-- .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:** «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Project Gutenberg book 70959 (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 40](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/16/40/)
- next →: [sentence 42](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/16/42/)
- ↑ back to [Xxii.--a Story of the Great Famine.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/16/)