---
title: The Father Tiger grew old and began to fail, and just before his dea… — Folk tales from Tibet · tree and pragmatics
description: The Father Tiger grew old and began to fail, and just before his death he sent for his three children and addressed them as follows: Who acts: Father Tiger, death, his. A sentence of «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, The Story of the Tiger and the Man., with its dep
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75000/3/2/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Folk tales from Tibet](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75000/) / [The Story of the Tiger and the Man.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75000/3/) / 2

# Folk tales from Tibet, The Story of the Tiger and the Man., sentence 2

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The Father Tiger grew old and began to fail, and just before his death he sent for his three children and addressed them as follows:

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Father Tiger, death, his · **What happens:** grow, begin, fail, send, address, follow · **To what, where:** Tigers

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, The Story of the Tiger and the Man.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Father Tiger, death, his), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg75000:3:2
# text = The Father Tiger grew old and began to fail, and just before his death he sent for his three children and addressed them as follows:
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	Father	Father	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	compound	_	_
3	Tiger	Tiger	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	grew	grow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
7	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
8	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
9	fail	fail	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
12	just	just	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
13	before	before	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	death	death	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nsubj	_	_
16	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
17	sent	send	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
18	for	for	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
19	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	21	nmod:poss	_	_
20	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	21	nummod	_	_
21	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	obl	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
23	addressed	address	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
24	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	obj	_	_
25	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	26	mark	_	_
26	follows	follow	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **grow** | past | the Father Tiger |  |  |  |  | old *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **begin** | past | the Father Tiger *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 3 | **fail** | to-infinitive | the Father Tiger *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn succeed-74-3-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **send** | past | his death |  |  |  |  | for death's three children | vn confine-92-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **address** | past | the Father Tiger *not said here* | Tigers *= tiger* |  |  |  |  | vn illustrate-25.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Destination |
| 6 | **follow** | present | the Father Tiger *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 7 | **die** |  | his *= he* |  |  |  |  |  | nom death «event intransitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, Project Gutenberg book 75000 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75000/3/1/)
- next →: [sentence 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75000/3/3/)
- ↑ back to [The Story of the Tiger and the Man.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75000/3/)