---
title: It will be difficult for the men to find firewood and water, and dif… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: It will be difficult for the men to find firewood and water, and difficult for the oxen to find grass. Who acts: men. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 15, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 15, sentence 16

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It will be difficult for the men to find firewood and water, and difficult for the oxen to find grass.

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**Who acts:** men · **What happens:** be, find · **To what, where:** firewood, grass

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 15. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (men), 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:pg74064:15:16
# text = It will be difficult for the men to find firewood and water, and difficult for the oxen to find grass.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	expl	_	_
2	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	cop	_	_
4	difficult	difficult	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
5	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj	_	_
8	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
9	find	find	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	csubj	_	_
10	firewood	firewood	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
15	difficult	difficult	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	conj	_	_
16	for	for	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	oxen	oxen	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	find	find	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	advcl	_	_
21	grass	grass	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | future |  |  |  |  |  | difficult *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **find** | to-infinitive | the men | firewood and water |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent firewood=Topic |
| 3 | **be** |  |  |  |  |  |  | for the oxen | tree rules |
| 4 | **find** | to-infinitive |  | grass |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent grass=Topic |

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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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