---
title: But the grasshopper kept quiet and never said a word to anyone, alth… — Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria · tree and pragmatics
description: But the grasshopper kept quiet and never said a word to anyone, although he was very hungry. Who acts: grasshopper. A sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper., with its dependency tree and the pragma
---

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# Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper., sentence 20

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But the grasshopper kept quiet and never said a word to anyone, although he was very hungry.

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**Who acts:** grasshopper · **What happens:** keep, not say, be · **To what, where:** word, anyone · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (grasshopper), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg70959:6:20
# text = But the grasshopper kept quiet and never said a word to anyone, although he was very hungry.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	grasshopper	grasshopper	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	kept	keep	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	quiet	quiet	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
7	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	8	advmod	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	word	word	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
11	to	to	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	anyone	anyone	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	10	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
14	although	although	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	cop	_	_
17	very	very	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
18	hungry	hungry	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **keep** | past | the grasshopper |  |  |  |  | quiet *property* | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **not** **say** *speech: assert* | past | the grasshopper *not said here* | a word | anyone |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent word=Topic to anyone=Recipient |
| 3 | **is** | past | grasshopper |  |  |  |  | hungry *property* | tree rules |

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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:** «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.

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