Example sentences of "[vb mod] [adv] [verb] [vb pp] to be " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 1 | He must already have begun to be aware that his dependency on alcohol was weakening his creative drive . |
| 2 | He might well have settled to be a good chief for the clan that you say you 're so concerned for , Eachuinn Maclean . |
| 3 | Where James might well have preferred to be a private man , it was quite clear that circumstances would not allow him to become one . |
| 4 | There is no doubt that the two old ladies did a little plotting to marry their favourite grandchildren off to on another ; but without the events of 1979 their dearest hopes might never have come to be . |
| 5 | Although Offa may once have aspired to be ‘ king of the English ’ , Cenwulf did not , and it is arguable , for all his control of southern England apart from Wessex , that Mercian power declined in his reign . |
| 6 | They could hardly have afforded to be so . |
| 7 | They could even have proven to be the negative experience of small ethnic enclaves defending themselves in hostile environments , but even this viewpoint can only be speculation . |
| 8 | Outside help was essential , but war-torn British industry was stretched to breaking capacity and the survival of a handful of mice was too thin a basis for disrupting existing essential activities to pursue what may well have appeared to be an academic will-o'-the-wisp . |
| 9 | In the ancient world slaves had been most commonly used as domestic servants and artisans , and this may well have continued to be true in the Middle Ages . |
| 10 | In 1828 , a plaque tells you , they were visited by the romantic Abbé Liszt , in the company of one Caroline de Saint-Cricq , who would hardly have expected to be thus immortalized for performing so brief a duet with the pianist composer . |
| 11 | DAAN VAN DER MEULEN is best known in English-speaking circles as the first reliable explorer of the Wadi Hadhramaut in South Africa , a little-known , wild region , riven by tribal feuds , hardly explored , and fraught with danger for the outsider ; though he himself would probably have liked to be remembered equally for his services in the Dutch colonial administration in Sumatra . |
| 12 | Although now remembered solely for his pictures , he would probably have preferred to be recognised as a man of science , and the man who taught Sir Henry Stanley the rudiments of expedition photography . |
| 13 | France was neither oblivious of nor indifferent to the outcome of the war which she was fighting and for which , as the US kept saying , she was primarily responsible ; but to have had a chance of winning at that stage it would probably have had to be a French rather than a Vietnamese war . |
| 14 | He would clearly have preferred to be talking to Fiona on his other side , but the award was having to be paid for with politeness . |
| 15 | An indication as to what his position would logically have had to be , had he not held these false presuppositions , is evident from his discussion of the validity of baptism when administered by a woman . |
| 16 | He would dearly have loved to be with them and greatly regretted that age precluded any such thing . |