---
title: “Are you the gardener?” asked the king. — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: “Are you the gardener?” asked the king. Who acts: king, gardener. 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 72

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“Are you the gardener?” asked the king.

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**Who acts:** king, gardener · **What happens:** be, ask · **To what, where:** gardener, king · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (king, gardener), 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:pg74064:10:74
# text = “Are you the gardener?” asked the king.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
3	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	gardener	gardener	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
8	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | the king *= king* | the gardener |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | the gardener |  | the king |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent king=Recipient |

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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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- ← previous: [sentence 71](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/10/71/)
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- ↑ back to [Opening, part 10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/10/)

