belay vs fight shy of

belay

verb
  • To lay aside; stop; cancel. 

  • To handle a climbing rope to prevent (a climber) from falling to the ground. 

  • To make (a rope) fast by turning it around a fastening point such as a cleat. 

  • The general command to stop or cease. 

  • simple past tense of belie (“encompass”) 

noun
  • The object to which a rope is secured. 

  • A location at which a climber stops and builds an anchor with which to secure their partner. 

  • The securing of a rope to a rock or other projection. 

fight shy of

verb
  • To avoid something. 

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