---
title: On a certain occasion the Teacher related the following story: — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: On a certain occasion the Teacher related the following story: Who acts: Teacher. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 7, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 7, sentence 15

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On a certain occasion the Teacher related the following story:

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**Who acts:** Teacher · **What happens:** relate, follow · **To what, where:** following story, certain occasion

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 7. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Teacher), 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:pg74064:7:17
# text = On a certain occasion the Teacher related the following story:
1	On	on	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	certain	certain	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	occasion	occasion	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	Teacher	Teacher	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	related	relate	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	following	follow	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	10	amod	_	_
10	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **relate** | past | the Teacher | the following story |  | a certain occasion |  |  | vn involve-107.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent story=Theme |
| 2 | **follow** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=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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