---
title: They were the proper stuff to hand out to the back-biters. — Folk tales of Sind and Guzarat · tree and pragmatics
description: They were the proper stuff to hand out to the back-biters. Who acts: lines. A sentence of «Folk tales of Sind and Guzarat» by C. A. Kincaid, Makhdum Niamat Ullah and Makhdum Nuh., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Folk tales of Sind and Guzarat, Makhdum Niamat Ullah and Makhdum Nuh., sentence 71

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They were the proper stuff to hand out to the back-biters.

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**Who acts:** lines · **What happens:** be, hand out · **To what, where:** proper stuff, back biters

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This is a sentence of «Folk tales of Sind and Guzarat» by C. A. Kincaid, Makhdum Niamat Ullah and Makhdum Nuh.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lines), 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:pg76982:10:71
# text = They were the proper stuff to hand out to the back-biters.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
2	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
4	proper	proper	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	stuff	stuff	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	hand	hand	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	acl	_	_
8	out	out	ADP	RP	_	7	compound:prt	_	_
9	to	to	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
11	back	back	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	biters	biter	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past | lines *= line* | the proper stuff |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **hand out** | to-infinitive |  |  | the back biters |  |  |  | vn contribute-13.2 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent to biter=Recipient |

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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:** «Folk tales of Sind and Guzarat» by C. A. Kincaid, Project Gutenberg book 76982 (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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