---
title: We returned, supposing: ‘He must have gone on ahead of us.’” — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: We returned, supposing: ‘He must have gone on ahead of us.’” Who acts: We, cloud. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 3, sentence 130

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We returned, supposing: ‘He must have gone on ahead of us.’”

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**Who acts:** We, cloud · **What happens:** return, suppose, go

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (We, cloud), 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:pg74064:3:135
# text = We returned, supposing: ‘He must have gone on ahead of us.’”
1	We	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	returned	return	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
4	supposing	suppose	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	10	punct	_	_
6	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
8	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
9	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	aux	_	_
10	gone	go	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	2	parataxis	_	_
11	on	on	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
12	ahead	ahead	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **return** | past | We |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **suppose** | gerund | We *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **go** | must · perfect | cloud |  |  |  |  | on us | vn occur-48.3-2 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme on we=Location |

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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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