Seamen have a custom, when they meet a whale, to fling him out an empty tub by way of amusement, to divert him from laying violent hands upon the ship.
A college joke to cure the dumps.
One enemy can do more hurt than ten friends can do good.
A favor is half granted, when graciously refused.
You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.
I used to wonder how a man of birth and spirit could endure to be wholly insignificant and obscure in a foreign country, when he might live with lustre in his own.