captain vs tend

captain

verb
  • To act as captain 

  • To exercise command of a ship, aircraft or sports team. 

noun
  • An honorific title given to a prominent person. See colonel. 

  • The head boy of a school. 

  • A maître d', a headwaiter. 

  • A chief or leader. 

  • An army officer with a rank between the most senior grade of lieutenant and major. 

  • A naval officer with a rank between commander and commodore. 

  • The person lawfully in command of a ship or other vessel. 

  • One of the athletes on a sports team who is designated to make decisions, and is allowed to speak for his team with a referee or official. 

  • A commissioned officer in the United States Navy, Coast Guard, NOAA Corps, or PHS Corps of a grade superior to a commander and junior to a rear admiral (lower half). A captain is equal in grade or rank to a United States Army, Marine Corps, or Air Force colonel. 

  • The leader of a group of workers. 

tend

verb
  • To accompany as an assistant or protector; to care for the wants of; to look after; to watch; to guard. 

  • To be likely, or probable to do something, or to have a certain habit or leaning. 

  • To kindle; ignite; set on fire; light; inflame; burn. 

  • To look after (e.g. an ill person.) 

  • To contribute to or toward some outcome. 

  • To manage (an anchored vessel) when the tide turns, to prevent it from entangling the cable when swinging. 

  • To make a tender of; to offer or tender. 

  • To wait (upon), as attendants or servants; to serve; to attend. 

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