Not to care a straw for one. In Latin, “[Aliquem] nihili, flocci, nauci, pili, teruncii facere.” To hold one in no esteem; to defy one as not worth your steel.
Not worth a straw. Worthless. In French, “Je n'en donnerais pas un fétu (or un zeste).” Not worth a rap; not worth a pin's point; not worth a fig (q.v.); not worth a twopenny dam, etc.
She wears a straw in her ear. She is looking out for another husband. This is a French expression, and refers to the ancient custom of placing a straw between the ears of horses for sale.
The last straw. The only hope left; the last penny.
'Tis the last straw that breaks the horse's (or camel's) back. In weighing articles, as salt, tea, sugar, etc., it is the last which turns the scale; and there is an ultimate point of endurance beyond which calamity breaks a man down.
To carry off the straw (“Enlever la paille”). To bear off the belle. The pun is between “pal,” a slang word for a favourite, and “paille,” straw. The French palot means a “pal.” Thus Gervais says-
“Mais, oncore un coup, man palot.”To catch at a straw. To hope a forlorn hope. A drowning man will catch at a straw.
Le Coup d'OEil Purin, p. 64.
To make bricks without straw. To attempt to do something without the proper and necessary materials. The allusion is to the exaction of the Egyptian taskmasters mentioned in Exodus v. 6-14. Even to the present, “bricks” in India, etc., are made of mud and straw dried in the sun. To make plum-puddings without plums.
To stumble at a straw. “Nodos in scirpo quoerere.” To look for knots in a bulrush (which has none). To stumble in a plain way.
To throw straws against the wind. To contend uselessly and feebly against what is irresistible; to sweep back the Atlantic with a besom.