wade vs work one's way

wade

verb
  • to walk through (water or similar impediment); to pass through by wading 

  • To enter recklessly. 

  • to progress with difficulty 

  • to walk through water or something that impedes progress. 

noun
  • An act of wading. 

  • A ford; a place to cross a river. 

work one's way

verb
  • Synonym of make one's way 

How often have the words wade and work one's way occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )