Example sentences of "[was/were] a [noun] [v-ing] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | At home they had behaved as if she were a toddler going to a first party in a party frock rather than a huge ungainly student eighteen years of age going to university dressed from head to toe in dark clothes . |
| 2 | He had n't played rugby football since leaving school but he tackled the girl as if he were a wing-threequarter playing for Ireland at Lansdowne Road . |
| 3 | In those days the fieldworker retained his status as a privileged stranger and proceeded to make a catalogue of ancient manners and customs much as if he were a policeman investigating a crime . |
| 4 | The vultures were a nuisance swooping down if you were carrying food . |
| 5 | King : Then stand not so , dear Wapping , when you speak , All stiff and formal as you were a judge Preparing to send a murderer to the scaffold . |
| 6 | He hated illness , hated it with an inner anger as though sickness were a devil attacking his life , his plans for his future , his energy . |
| 7 | I knew there were a bugger coming then . |
| 8 | She giggled when his second attempt ended in the same way , and when he grasped her in a great bear hug , she was able to slip away as easily as if it were a child holding her . |
| 9 | Its nervous system is being controlled , as irresistibly as if it were a helpless drug addict , or as if the cuckoo were a scientist plugging electrodes into its brain . |
| 10 | One moment standing at Reception and then wafted , as if he were a feather fluttering , to the car on the kerb . |
| 11 | It was as if Chapman were a captain trying to keep afloat on a treacherous sea in a small boat that threatened at any moment to spring a leak . |
| 12 | They were a family living in Rome for better or for worse , that would n't change any more than the world would change . |
| 13 | She stared into her coffee as though it were a pool reflecting the past . |
| 14 | And it is true that if , for example , there were a library catering specifically for the mentally retarded , this would be the first to be closed because it would create the greatest publicity . |
| 15 | If there was a thief living in his woods , he did not want anyone to know . |
| 16 | There was a trench running down this one , too , its contents so foul that he walked with his feet astride it . |
| 17 | He was a pacifist professing the admirable , old-fashioned virtues of his Quaker upbringing . |
| 18 | Though it was a chance meeting with Travis when he called at the apartment block , ostensibly to visit Leith and Sebastian , when the two bumped into each other . |
| 19 | When I was a boy living on a croft at Aywick , the corn bunting was a familiar bird . |
| 20 | It was something I 'd dreamed of since I was a boy humping golf-bags nearly as big as me . |
| 21 | There was a boy sitting in the car . |
| 22 | Cos I I remember looking at that house years back , you know , when I was a boy walking about you know . |
| 23 | The roughly cut lawn led right to the stone doorstep and was bordered by a flower garden at one side and a summer house at the other , beyond which was a yard showing some outhouses . |
| 24 | Analysis of covariance gave no significant difference between groups , although there was a trend favouring 5-ASA . |
| 25 | The harbour beyond was a myriad sparkling lights from moored boats and yachts and across the bay the twinkling lights of Palma lit up palm trees and white tower blocks , making them look more stunningly magical by night than by day . |
| 26 | It was a thriller starring Donald Pleasence and Peter Vaughan , and was made at Anglia TV 's Norwich studios and on location in London . |
| 27 | One brother of hers , at least , rallied to the cause — Samuel Hasted , younger than his sister , who was a cooper living in Bermuda Street , Stepney , a small row of eight houses just off Commercial Road . |
| 28 | So I went up and there was a bloke standing in the middle of the toilets , by the basin , tossing himself off , and I said , ‘ What do you think you 're doing ? ’ |
| 29 | Bruno turned and stalked out of the room , then came back and pointed the Luger at Maxim once more and said Yes , there was a taxi waiting . |
| 30 | There was a sister watching us all the time , and when we went to walk out into the garden she said it was n't allowed . |