Example sentences of "[vb past] [adv] [been] a [noun sg] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 1 | Well then while I was serving as a detective , you can just imagine I made plenty of arrests , and I got along reasonably well with most people , but there was one man I hated yes I hated him , I , I 'd only been a detective I should think for a period of about , oh five or six months , and a man , he called on the Reverend who was the , the vicar of St. Mary where |
| 2 | There 'd just been a cancellation . ’ |
| 3 | Well , I 'd always been a bit too busy — and clever ! |
| 4 | He 'd always been a dairy farmer , you see , like I am . |
| 5 | She had n't deserved their kindness , their good wishes — she 'd hardly been a boon companion of late . |
| 6 | You see , he 'd once been a costermonger himself , but that was before he married Miss Roach , the baker 's daughter . |
| 7 | ‘ Also , if you 'd really been a journalist you 'd have known what a ‘ stringer ’ is . |
| 8 | Lawrence could n't make you feel that , because he 'd never been a worker . |
| 9 | But the whole experience left me ruefully feeling that it had perhaps been a mistake to publish a report about them . |
| 10 | Milton remarked that this chair had hitherto been a sinecure , though it carried a salary of over £100 per annum and would ‘ serve any gentleman especially a law[y]er ’ . |
| 11 | On some mornings the ducks on Three Island Pond would take off in great arcing flights against the sun , round and behind the Cages and out of sight , round again and behind the distant trees and then suddenly back again as if it had all been a mistake and they had never meant to fly off in the first place . |
| 12 | She had been convinced at first that it had all been a mistake , that she had indeed misread the unspoken message contained in the postcard . |
| 13 | Surely they realised that it had all been a mistake once you explained ? ’ |
| 14 | And then I made a mistake , I felt it had all been a sacrifice in vain , I felt I had to make him appreciate what I 'd done , that he ought to let me go — so I tried to tell him . |
| 15 | But it had all been a trick , a dreadful trick . |
| 16 | It had all been a trick , all that sweet , hot loving , that tenderness , just a cruel device to help him find out what she knew . |
| 17 | But it had all been a bluff . |
| 18 | Within Dotty 's hearing a home pirate remarked that he thought it had all been a storm in a teacup . |
| 19 | Drugged again , they regained consciousness outside the valley in anguish that it had all been a dream . |
| 20 | It had all been a dream ; perhaps she 'd never even left it . |
| 21 | Perhaps it had all been a dream . |
| 22 | But it had all been a sham . |
| 23 | Now he saw it had all been a sham . |
| 24 | He would come exuberantly into the office after ops with his crew tagging along behind him , to tell us that our weather forecast had been spot on , it had all been a piece of cake , bombs went down — Wham ! — right on the target , no trouble at all , good show ! , and here they were back on the old tarmac , cheating death again , etc . |
| 25 | After so long thinking that the reason for our kidnap had been bad feeling between Britain and Iran , and knowing that , before the Rushdie affair at least , fences had been mended , it was hard to believe now that it had all been a mirage . |
| 26 | He had only been a stop-gap , to fill in after Father Collins 's long , thirty-five-year ministry and the appointment of a permanent successor , if there were to be a successor . |
| 27 | as if all the work of the past four months had only been a dream , the cutting and the drilling , the painting , the moulding of the lead wire . |
| 28 | It had worked with Billy , truck driver and reluctant witness — but Billy had only been a rehearsal for this , the main event . |
| 29 | He told me later that he had only been a guard for fifteen months , also that the normal takings on this section of the line were approximately £10 , so he was only too pleased to work out a 26% discount for a group booking that realised BR £77.35 from our party . |
| 30 | He realised it had only been a bait for which he had fallen . |