Example sentences of "they could [not/n't] [vb infin] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 1 | The suggestion at the time that the Labour Party had been behind Profumo 's downfall was a little unfair to many members who repeatedly expressed their misgivings about the scandalous imputations , which several of them could not regard as a proper currency for a political difference . |
| 2 | Because the clergy were on the whole ministering to the poor , many of them could not avoid being caught up in the unrest , violence and fear . |
| 3 | The maid who opened the door to them could not take her eyes off the great fat woman in the biscuit straw hat with big cloth roses on its brim , and the cape that just covered her shoulders and showed an expanse of blue cotton bosom , the like she had never seen before . |
| 4 | Some of them could not believe that they had found themselves in a church , and were only stopping off en route to a nearby pub . |
| 5 | The major innovations and discoveries of the 20th century such as transistors , penicillin or nuclear power could not have been predicted before their time nor do their stories have much in common except the the research which led to them could not have been directed towards their discovery . |
| 6 | Last night the atmosphere between them could not have been more different . |
| 7 | But most of them could not understand his lasting despair , for was he not free and in the very home of democracy ? |
| 8 | The British Communists and the large group of supporters they had built around them could not sidestep the problem . |
| 9 | I find they resemble grit and taste the same — even the health store from which I bought them could not enlighten me . |
| 10 | the university has a new duty , we are told : there is a besieging host , everincreasing , of Indians , Africans , Commonwealth people in general , Levantines , who aspire to become university teachers of English literature , and must therefore have a PhD — preferably a Cambridge one ( though it is admitted that a large proportion of them could n't hope to take the English Tripos with much credit — even if they could pass ) . |
| 11 | If , for example , we knew what animals with neocortices could do that species lacking them could n't do we would know something about the cortex without having to ablate it in a single animal . |
| 12 | If you let somebody else get stuff on your book , and some of them could n't pay it , you know , you 've no means of paying it . |
| 13 | Then each one of them could n't help noticing that the others seemed to be walking faster and faster . |
| 14 | Some of them could n't afford it . |
| 15 | Some of them could n't afford i You had I think you had to put something in . |
| 16 | All day and then he got all to do at lunch time yeah they kept it up all the day , they had separate play time , they had had to eat their lunch in the class room all they were allowed was a piece of fruit , a bread and water and they all had to have , you know , they had a bread roll supplied by the school an a an apple I think And Jan made them write out their names and some of them could n't write their name ! |
| 17 | The Consultants at least have to recognise , they could n't fix that the closure of was strongly opposed but it was a mystery to all of us except obviously Mr on the December how they were unable to nevertheless , to accept a little dissimilar rejection of part of my and the associated increased in the despite the fact that seven different people are of the same several different people same margin Mr but not . |
| 18 | The girls would return from extended lunchbreaks in the city centre — a problem Personnel conceded they could n't resolve — rustling their voluminous plastic bags whose contents they would then exhaustively compare and discuss . |
| 19 | Just as they could n't leave that bug in her phone . |
| 20 | He , they left the er they 'd gone said leave it in the conservatory , then he went out and and and and er shut his conservatory so they could n't leave it so they asked me to keep it for him . |
| 21 | So they could n't leave them all standing outside . |
| 22 | If the parents and their witnesses had to travel to the Scottish mainland , this would involve them not only in time away they could n't spare , but also travelling and accommodation expenses . |
| 23 | Since they could n't talk about that , they preferred not to talk at all . |
| 24 | He had reasoned that , even if they could n't talk there , the morning concert might do her some good , that she had never willingly set foot out of the flat since it happened , that in any case he had a father 's responsibility towards his younger sister , and he had promised to go and hear her . |
| 25 | They could n't talk to me . |
| 26 | They could n't avoid being seen together and she braced herself for the blast from Georg and from her parents . |
| 27 | until one day they could n't think of any way that you could may improve it . |
| 28 | 11 out of the 20 forms returned left blanks here and two said they could n't think of anything to say . |
| 29 | In the past , in the past these children would be so severely mentally handicapped that they could n't lead a normal life , but if , if your able to control this disease and bring them up intellectually normal so that they 're like everybody else , they 're going to have the same life expectation and hopes and aspirations as the best , that 's the best of us , and what do women do when they get to the |
| 30 | But even if this tape is going to record the last speech of somebody famous and it did n't get and therefore they could n't record it , that is co , the consequence of a delay , you know , a fall of snow or our vehicle breaking down or something not being done , or missed some in human , some human error , it 's not our , we do n't lay , we 'll give , we 'll insure or offer transit liability on the value of the goods providing you 've got additional full transit liability with us , but we wo n't for the loss of business because you did n't get it . |