cess vs duty

cess

noun
  • An assessed tax, duty, or levy. 

  • Usually preceded by good or (more commonly) bad: luck or success. 

  • The area along either side of a railroad track which is kept at a lower level than the sleeper bottom, in order to provide drainage. 

verb
  • To levy a cess. 

duty

noun
  • A tax placed on imports or exports; a tariff. 

  • That which one is morally or legally obligated to do. 

  • The state of being at work and responsible for or doing a particular task. 

  • The efficiency of an engine, especially a steam pumping engine, as measured by work done by a certain quantity of fuel; usually, the number of pounds of water lifted one foot by one bushel of coal (94 lbs. old standard), or by 1 cwt. (112 lbs., England, or 100 lbs., United States). 

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