---
title: That very instant I heard the sound of the earth collapsing. — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: That very instant I heard the sound of the earth collapsing. Who acts: I, earth. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 10, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 10, sentence 156

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That very instant I heard the sound of the earth collapsing.

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**Who acts:** I, earth · **What happens:** hear, collapse · **To what, where:** sound

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 10. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, earth), 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:pg74064:10:160
# text = That very instant I heard the sound of the earth collapsing.
1	That	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	3	nsubj	_	_
2	very	very	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	instant	instant	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
4	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	sound	sound	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	earth	earth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	_
11	collapsing	collapse	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	10	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hear** | past | I | the sound of the earth |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer sound=Stimulus |
| 2 | **collapse** | gerund | the earth *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |

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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 grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Project Gutenberg book 74064 (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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