Example sentences of "[noun pl] had [been] [v-ing] the [noun] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 1 | The Secte Rouge guards had been charging the Marines with their machetes , to little effect , though a couple of Marines had gone down . |
| 2 | After a dress rehearsal for a Symphony Hour show , I suggested , as producer , that in the adagio movement of the main symphonic item the violins had been taking the tempo slightly too fast . |
| 3 | Since mid century , philanthropists and social reformers had been urging the removal of the population of the inner-city slums to the more salubrious outskirts of the city . |
| 4 | The patrol of four unarmoured Land Rovers had been testing the safety of a Serb-held route to the northern town of Tuzla . |
| 5 | One dealer of the author 's acquaintance would keep telling his clients : " There 's been a lot of buying this morning " when what he really meant was the dealers had been selling the stock all morning . |
| 6 | Writers , poets and bards had been telling the stories for centuries but it was not until the Victorians that a visual interpretation was recorded and that was essentially romantic and ill-informed . |
| 7 | Department officials had been monitoring the convoy which spent about two weeks at a roadside halt near Ardglass before slipping into Downpatrick overnight . |
| 8 | The Dorset industry must have continued from its Pre-conquest days up to the moment of expansion ; its potters had been supplying the army in the middle of the first century , as is evident from Waddon Hill ( Webster , 1960 , 93 , 95 ; 1965 , 142 ) . |
| 9 | Ross Chisholm , head of local planning and transport , said officers had been studying the effect of the traffic restrictions since they were introduced . |
| 10 | At the same time , it should not be forgotten that some writers had been advocating the use of multiple methods for years : |
| 11 | All day the riddle of the wrecked laundry basket in the showers had been exercising the teacher 's faculty of deduction . |
| 12 | The ghillies had been gathering the herds into the area for days . |
| 13 | Park official Fred Haala said some trippers had been harassing the crocodile . |
| 14 | This result was not unexpected , given the relatively short period these patients had been following the gluten free diet before entering the protocol . |
| 15 | Finally , up to one in five known heroin users had been injecting the drug during 1985–6 , a worrying increase on the previous year . |
| 16 | On Sept. 2 All-India Radio reported that Pakistani forces had been shelling the Punch sector in Jammu and Kashmir since Aug. 26 and that a woman and two children had been killed . |
| 17 | Security forces had been clearing the area when the bomb exploded . |
| 18 | Mr Poole said there was evidence that some ambulance workers in the shires had been breaching the ban at the request of managers . |
| 19 | During her time in Rhodesia , Army magazines had been celebrating the centenary of Booth 's own marriage and however dedicated his soldiers very few of the single women did not chafe against his restrictions when opportunity presented . |
| 20 | The two militia leaders had been boycotting the Cabinet for several months . |
| 21 | He 'd been up there , in the roof space when the men had been installing the dome . |
| 22 | No wonder men had been watching the house . |
| 23 | Three local anglers had been watching the pantomime with great enjoyment , and I have yet to live it down . |
| 24 | Ever since filing his first application as British Atlantic , Randolph Fields had been scouring the world looking for aircraft of the right type and price . |
| 25 | For the past several days , the warder said , jail authorities had been pestering the police to get more helpers … . |
| 26 | Victoria Hernandez , telecommunications analyst for InfoCorp Europe , Paris , said the French and Swiss operators had been discussing the agreement for some time , trying to iron out the administrative problems involved . |
| 27 | However , the results — far from presenting a more ‘ acceptable ’ picture of English housing — bore out everything that housing experts had been warning the government about for the past few years of increasing housing cuts . |
| 28 | Since December 1989 opposition groups had been demanding the trial of former President Yumjaagiyn Tsedenbal for causing economic stagnation in the 1960s and 1970s . |
| 29 | Customs & Excise introduced the changes , which will be back-dated to 1 July , after it found hotels had been treating the supply of packed lunches to guests as zero-rated ( Caterer , 27 June–3 July ) . |
| 30 | One of my students had been using the machine and she had n't been knitting tuck , so the tuck brushes had been put out of work . |