set the Thames on fire

verb

Roget 471: be impossible etc. adj.; have no chance whatever.    attempt impossibilities; square the circle, wash a blackamoor white; skin a flint; make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, make bricks without straw; have nothing to go upon; weave a rope of sand, build castles in the air, prendre la lune avec les dents [Fr.], extract sunbeams from cucumbers, set the Thames on fire, milk a he-goat into a sieve, catch a weasel asleep, rompre l'anguille au genou [Fr.], be in two places at once.    ... show more

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