gun vs hired gun

gun

noun
  • A person who carries or uses a rifle, shotgun or handgun. 

  • A cannon with relatively long barrel, operating with relatively low angle of fire, and having a high muzzle velocity. 

  • A pattern that "fires" out other patterns. 

  • The biceps. 

  • Any implement designed to fire a projectile from a tube. 

  • A very portable, short firearm, for hand use, which fires bullets or projectiles, such as a handgun, revolver, pistol, or Derringer. 

  • A cannon with a 6-inch/155mm minimum nominal bore diameter and tube length 30 calibers or more. See also: howitzer; mortar. 

  • A less portable, long firearm that fires bullets or projectiles; a rifle, either manual, automatic or semi-automatic; a flintlock, musket or shotgun. 

  • A device or tool that applies something rather than projecting it. 

  • Violent blasts of wind. 

  • An expert. 

  • Someone excellent, surpassingly wonderful, or cool. 

  • A device for projecting a hard object very forcefully; a firearm or cannon. 

  • A firearm or cannon used for saluting or signalling.^(21-gun salute) 

  • A device or tool that projects a substance. 

  • A long surfboard designed for surfing big waves (not the same as a longboard, a gun has a pointed nose and is generally a little narrower). 

  • An electron gun. 

verb
  • To offer vigorous support to (a person or cause). 

  • To seek to attack someone; to take aim at someone; used with for. 

  • To masturbate while observing and visible to a corrections officer. 

  • To cause to speed up. 

  • To practice fowling or hunting small game; chiefly in participial form: to go gunning. 

hired gun

noun
  • A person who is employed as an armed guard, enforcer, or mercenary and who is prepared to use gunplay or similar violent methods in order to assert the interests of his or her employer. 

  • A person who is employed to advance the interests of his or her employer, especially in a vigorous manner using such methods as political lobbying, legal advocacy, or persuasion. 

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