Example sentences of "be at the mercy " in BNC.

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1 ‘ You 're at the mercy of some pilot and God knows what state they 're in , ’ he added .
2 But of course it 's , it 's a very tough deal for women , I mean women in erm in a way really get the raw end of it because that to some extent they 're at the mercy of the whole system , even though they can if they absolutely have to .
3 He says you 're at the mercy of the elements and you just go where the weather takes you .
4 And you 're at the mercy of the landlord putting the rent up Brenda .
5 Like you say you 're at the mercy .
6 The situation that , that a lot of people find themselves in nowadays , now er council housing is no longer available to an awful lot of people , is that they 're at the mercy of private landlords , and in order to have any kind of home they have to go along this sort of conditions and rent levels laid down by private landlords .
7 The women 's race looks set for the second successive year to be at the mercy of Rosa Mota , a winner at Olympic and world level as well as the three times European champion .
8 Every man 's hand will be against him and gassing , snaring and poisoning will be the order of the day , with perhaps a bounty on his brush and he will be at the mercy of every council official , cowboy and yobbo in the country .
9 His daytime fear is that ordinary people in the coming , computerised society ‘ could be at the mercy of the technocrats ’ .
10 The Genoese city of Famagusta did not intend to be at the mercy of Mamelukes .
11 Within two or three years , the majority of a grafted vine 's network would be dependent not upon the grafted roots , but upon the regenerated root system of the producing vine and as such would be at the mercy of phylloxera .
12 Unlike other fuels you wo n't be at the mercy of the volatile world energy market either .
13 He was to be at the mercy of both and early on he knew it .
14 For the election of the other four you will be at the mercy of other people 's votes .
15 The range of oriental rugs on offer in a dealer 's showroom or department store is overwhelming , and you may feel yourself to be at the mercy of the salesman .
16 If there is no non-contingent link between behaviour and mental state ( that is , if we accept ( a ) ) , we shall never be able to show ( b ) to be true , and hence we shall be at the mercy of a local scepticism of the very strongest form ( cf. 1.1 ) .
17 He seemed to me to be at the mercy of waves that tossed him back and forth between then and now : the real-and-actual and the desired .
18 The prosperity of the Catalan economy had thus come to be at the mercy of events outside Spain .
19 Most action was bound to be like this — a span , long or short , in which one did nothing — could do nothing except be at the mercy of one 's nerves — and then the moment , the test …
20 Something neither short nor long , beginning with V. Somewhere in or near Paris , though how near could be at the mercy of French postal zoning .
21 ‘ And Fenella would be at the mercy of Goibniu and the rest .
22 Future pension rates will be at the mercy of employers who take over subsidiaries of the Scottish Bus Group .
23 Future pension rates will be at the mercy of employers who take over subsidiaries of the Scottish Bus Group .
24 Even if there were agreement , much of the disputed territory would still be at the mercy of both Serb and Croat irregulars , acting outside the control of their Government , and those forces would continue to be a source of fighting and unrest unless they were disarmed .
25 You would be at the mercy of the hall 's acoustics and ideally you would need to practise a bit beforehand .
26 Other radicals demanded that foreign policy should no longer be at the mercy of " the ideas , valuations and methods of a sporting aristo-plutocracy " or " the obscure convolutions of diplomatic staffs " , that " there must be an end of the secret diplomacy which has plunged us into this catastrophe " and that the working classes should " lay down our own terms , make our own proclamations , establish our own diplomacy " .
27 Barring a last-minute volte-face by the MoD , the aircraft will then be at the mercy of the highest bidder , who might just be a scrap dealer .
28 There is a great need for more careful use of language , otherwise we shall be at the mercy of bureaucrats and their jargon .
29 Because it could n't wait until lunchtime and that , that 's perfectly understandable because he wants to feel in control of what 's going to happen to some degree , rather than just be at the mercy of someone else 's position .
30 And rather than being at the mercy of the autobiographer 's choice of what to mention , we can ask questions and open up areas of significant memory which would otherwise have been lost .
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