Example sentences of "[conj] [vb past] [verb] [adv] a " in BNC.

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1 An occasional treat or privilege for a child who has made a big effort to master a new skill or managed to give up a bad habit hardly comes into that category .
2 Time and again , they came upon heaps of white shard-like bones or tripped cursing over a trailing white , skeletal arm or leg protruding from its thin veil of soil .
3 For every dot that needed to build up a character a spark is generated by the printer which burns away the thin silver coating revealing the black backing paper .
4 At one time it looked like everything we 'd done in twenty years was going to be spread out on the table — and that included sating up a group to destabilise our closest ally if it got needed .
5 Several new plant species were recorded for the reserve but their most interesting find was of signs of a badger that had dug out a bees nest from the ground .
6 The forces that had called forth a great preacher like Griffith were passing and he needed to be taken out of the limelight .
7 The polemic in the newspapers had begun not over the kidnapping but over a fight that had broken out a few days previously in a bar much frequented by the young Sardinians who hung around the city and by the city gangs who sold them drugs .
8 It must have been seeing her reading Tennyson that had dredged up an old forgotten quotation .
9 I was silent for a moment , trying desperately hard to remember events that had happened only a few minutes earlier .
10 This latter is illustrated by the fact that until recently operating licences were issued more or less indiscriminately to any company that wanted to set up a sawmill .
11 State Papers and other sources indicate that Stringer ran a large foundry business , owned ships for exporting and importing metals and ordnance , and planned to set up a company for colonizing West Indian islands .
12 James was in every respect the kind of driver Alexander would get along with and that their enterprise did not finish so very far from winning , and failed to win not a few times only through misfortune — or the injustice of fate , speaks creditably of an underlying seriousness that they rarely allowed to show .
13 On March 28 , 1989 , Pérez and President Virgilio Barco Vargas of Colombia met on the Urena border bridge and agreed to set up a permanent commission , chaired by former Spanish Prime Minister Adolfo Suárez González , to look into their marine border dispute , which last erupted in August 1987 when a Colombian warship sailed into the Gulf of Venezuela ( known by Colombia as the Gulf of Guajira--see p. 35757 ) .
14 The government met in emergency session on May 22 and agreed to set up a commission of inquiry to investigate the assassination .
15 The Economy Ministers of Argentina , Brazil , Paraguay and Uruguay met on July 20 in the Uruguayan capital , Montevideo , and agreed to work out a joint set of rules to combat the dumping and sale of subsidised goods by non-members of their prospective common market agreed under the Mercosur Treaty of March 1991 [ see p. 38096 ] .
16 One day a subaltern got into a first-class railway carriage and found sitting there a ‘ coloured gentleman ’ .
17 She walked over to the pond and bent to pick up a small pebble , skimming it across the glittering water , watching the way it bounced , then sank , leaving behind it only ripples .
18 He 'd walked into the boathouse and tried to pick up an envelope and the floor had given way beneath him and a piece of beam was missing , and if I had n't been there with him he would certainly have drowned in the dock , impaled on something lurking beneath the surface .
19 Mr Bishop , who has plastic joints in his hips , knees and spine , is an ex-boxer and tried to put up a struggle , but they were too strong for him .
20 It bit me and scratched me , and tried to escape up a curtain , which perhaps explains why I prefer Koi any day .
21 She came up once and tried to get out a cry for help to the others standing there , but the laughing gripped her lungs and they thought she was fooling .
22 She could scarcely breathe , let alone struggle , but when she heard the sound of someone in the undergrowth she knew it was Travis and tried to get out a warning .
23 A girl came in and tried to haggle over a nineteenth-century vase , but Rachaela told her Mrs Mantini fixed the prices fairly and never reduced items .
24 They left and helped to set up a competitive operation within the kilometre circle .
25 ‘ The fire has been lit and allowed to die down a couple of times — and I once smelt the stuff . ’
26 They have been exacerbated by rumours that ethnic Germans from Soviet Asia are to be moved into the Kaliningrad region and allowed to set up an autonomous republic there .
27 An even bigger shock was in store when the organisers set to and began breaking out a peg for everyone .
28 While waiting he brought out a penknife and began whittling away a table-top .
29 As the front door slammed behind them , Josh finished drying his face and hands and began to put on a clean shirt and a stiff collar .
30 Gingerly she backed the old Mini away from the Bentley , then pushed the gear lever into first and began to drive forward a couple of feet .
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