---
title: It was tried to send a dog; it barked—Cock-a-doodle-doo!” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: It was tried to send a dog; it barked—Cock-a-doodle-doo!” Who acts: doo, Cock. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Tangalimlibo., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Tangalimlibo., sentence 130

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It was tried to send a dog; it barked—Cock-a-doodle-doo!”

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**Who acts:** doo, Cock · **What happens:** try, send, bark, doo · **To what, where:** doo, dog

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Tangalimlibo.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (doo, Cock), 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:pg71335:6:130
# text = It was tried to send a dog; it barked—Cock-a-doodle-doo!”
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux:pass	_	_
3	tried	try	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	send	send	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	dog	dog	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	10	punct	_	_
9	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
10	barked	bark	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	—	-	PUNCT	:	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	Cock	cock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	doodle	doodle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	doo	doo	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **try** | past · passive |  | doo |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **send** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive |  | a dog |  |  |  |  | vn confine-92-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent dog=Theme |
| 3 | **bark** | past | doo |  |  |  |  |  | vn animal\_sounds-38 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **doo** |  | Cock |  |  |  |  |  | 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:** «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Project Gutenberg book 71335 (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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