---
title: Then he ate that porridge and himself died on the spot. — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: Then he ate that porridge and himself died on the spot. Who acts: fellow. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 8, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 8, sentence 138

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Then he ate that porridge and himself died on the spot.

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**Who acts:** fellow · **What happens:** eat, die · **To what, where:** porridge, spot

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 8. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (fellow), 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:pg74064:8:140
# text = Then he ate that porridge and himself died on the spot.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	3	advmod	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	ate	eat	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	det	_	_
5	porridge	porridge	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
7	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	8	nsubj	_	_
8	died	die	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
9	on	on	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	spot	spot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **eat** | past | fellow | that porridge |  |  | then |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent porridge=Patient |
| 2 | **die** | past | fellow |  |  | the spot |  |  | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute |

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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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