---
title: A man who lacks intelligence spoils what is good Like the monkey who… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: A man who lacks intelligence spoils what is good Like the monkey who worked in the garden. Who acts: man, monkey. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 13, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 13, sentence 152

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A man who lacks intelligence spoils what is good Like the monkey who worked in the garden.

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**Who acts:** man, monkey · **What happens:** lack, spoil, be, work · **To what, where:** intelligence

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 13. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, monkey), 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:pg74064:13:161
# text = A man who lacks intelligence spoils what is good Like the monkey who worked in the garden.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
3	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	4	nsubj	_	_
4	lacks	lack	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	acl:relcl	_	_
5	intelligence	intelligence	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
6	spoils	spoil	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	9	nsubj	_	_
8	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
9	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	ccomp	_	_
10	Like	like	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	monkey	monkey	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
13	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	14	nsubj	_	_
14	worked	work	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	acl:relcl	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	garden	garden	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **lack** | present | a man | intelligence |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **spoil** | present | a man |  |  |  |  |  | vn entity\_specific\_cos-45.5 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 3 | **is** | present |  |  |  |  |  | like the monkey; what *nsubj*; good *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **work** | past | the monkey |  |  |  |  | in the garden | vn employment-95.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent in garden=Theme |

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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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