bug-a-boo vs fay

bug-a-boo

noun
  • A mythical, nocturnal creature; a hobgoblin. 

  • Any imagined fear or threat, or a fear presumed larger than it really is. 

fay

noun
  • A fairy. 

  • A white person. 

adj
  • Fairy like. 

  • White; white-skinned. 

  • Fitted closely together. 

verb
  • To cleanse; clean out. 

  • To join (pieces of timber) tightly. 

  • Of pieces of timber: to lie close together. 

How often have the words bug-a-boo and fay occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )