pass the hat vs seek

pass the hat

verb
  • To ask for money, especially from a group of people; to solicit donations or contributions. 

seek

verb
  • To ask for; to solicit; to beseech. 

  • To try to acquire or gain; to strive after; to aim at. 

  • To try to find; to look for; to search for. 

  • To try to reach or come to; to go to; to resort to. 

  • To navigate through a stream. 

  • To attempt, endeavour, try 

noun
  • The operation of navigating through a stream. 

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