---
title: The hawk, exerting his strength, flapped both his wings and attacked… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: The hawk, exerting his strength, flapped both his wings and attacked the quail with violence. Who acts: hawk. 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 23

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The hawk, exerting his strength, flapped both his wings and attacked the quail with violence.

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**Who acts:** hawk · **What happens:** exert, flap, attack · **To what, where:** strength, wings, quail

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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 (hawk), 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:pg74064:13:24
# text = The hawk, exerting his strength, flapped both his wings and attacked the quail with violence.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	hawk	hawk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
4	exerting	exert	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	2	acl	_	_
5	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	strength	strength	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
8	flapped	flap	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	both	both	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	11	det:predet	_	_
10	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	wings	wing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	attacked	attack	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	quail	quail	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	_
16	with	with	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	violence	violence	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **exert** | gerund | the hawk *not said here* | hawk's strength |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent strength=Theme |
| 2 | **flap** | past | the hawk | hawk's wings |  |  |  |  | vn crane-40.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent wing=Patient |
| 3 | **attack** | past | the hawk *not said here* | the quail |  |  |  | with violence | vn attack-60.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent quail=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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