catch at straws

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

But at the time I thought of none of these things—"drowning men will catch at straws," says the old adage—and my hastily formed plan seemed to me to promise success.

From Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches An Autobiography by Johnson, Clark, M.D.

But the frail death-agony effort to catch at straws of memory, straws of life from the past, brought on too great a nausea.

From England, My England by Lawrence, D. H. (David Herbert)

Drowning men catch at straws, and the spectacled visage of the auctioneer, as he clings wildly to his rostrum, is a perfect study of terrified imbecility.

From English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. by Everitt, Graham

It is said "the drowning catch at straws."

From Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal by Richardson, Sarah J.

Here was no shadowy depth of a ravine, but a broad plain,—a watery plain, into which the heavily weighted horses and riders sank, rising to cry for help and catch at straws.

From A Boy's Ride by Zollinger, Gulielma