balk vs strand

balk

verb
  • To leave or make balks in. 

  • To refuse suddenly. 

  • To stop short and refuse to go on. 

  • To leave heaped up; to heap up in piles. 

  • To omit, miss, or overlook by chance. 

  • To make a deceptive motion to deceive another player. 

  • To stop, check, block. 

  • To indicate to fishermen, by shouts or signals from shore, the direction taken by the shoals of herring. 

  • To engage in contradiction; to be in opposition. 

  • To disappoint; to frustrate. 

noun
  • Beam, crossbeam; squared timber; a tie beam of a house, stretching from wall to wall, especially when laid so as to form a loft, "the balks". 

  • The wall of earth at the edge of an excavation. 

  • The area of the table lying behind the baulk line. 

  • A sudden and obstinate stop. 

  • A hindrance or disappointment; a check. 

  • The rope by which fishing nets are fastened together. 

  • The area of the table lying behind the line from which the cue ball is initially shot, and from which a ball in hand must be played. 

  • An illegal motion by the pitcher, intended to deceive a runner. 

  • A motion used to deceive the opponent during a serve. 

  • An uncultivated ridge formed in the open field system, caused by the action of ploughing. 

strand

verb
  • To leave (someone) in a difficult situation; to abandon or desert. 

  • To form by uniting strands. 

  • To break a strand of (a rope). 

  • To run aground; to beach. 

  • To cause the third out of an inning to be made, leaving a runner on base. 

noun
  • A group of wires, usually twisted or braided. 

  • The shore or beach of the sea or ocean; shore; beach. 

  • A small brook or rivulet. 

  • A passage for water; gutter. 

  • A nucleotide chain. 

  • A string. 

  • A series of programmes on a particular theme or linked subject. 

  • An element in a composite whole; a sequence of linked events or facts; a logical thread. 

  • A street. 

  • An individual length of any fine, string-like substance. 

  • Each of the strings which, twisted together, make up a yarn, rope or cord. 

How often have the words balk and strand occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )