close as wax vs scrimp

close as wax

adj
  • miserly, tight, or secretive 

scrimp

adj
  • Short; scanty; curtailed. 

verb
  • To be frugal. 

  • To limit or straiten; to put on short allowance. 

  • To make too small or short. 

noun
  • A pinching miser; a niggard. 

How often have the words close as wax and scrimp occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )