When the Corn was ſow'd, I had no Harrow, but was forced to go over it my ſelf, and drag a great heavy Bough of a Tree over it, to Scratch it, as it may be call'd, rather than Rake or harrow it.
[A]s ſoon as the Bear got out to that part where the Limb of the Tree was weaker, Ha, ſays he [Man Friday] to us, now you ſee me teachee the Bear dance; ſo he falls a jumping and ſhaking the Bough, at which the Bear began to totter, but ſtood ſtill, and began to look behind him, to ſee how he ſhould get back; then indeed we did laugh heartily: […] Why don’t you ſhoot him? No ſhoot, ſays Friday, no yet; me ſhoot now, me no kill; me ſtay, give you one more laugh: and indeed ſo he did, as you will ſee preſently; for when the Bear ſee his Enemy gone, he comes back from the Bough where he ſtood; […]
1750 April, Mr Urban, Surry, April 4, letter sent to The Gentleman's Magazine, Vol. XX, page 182:
As I was riding on the 29th of last month I gathered a Hawthorn bough, full-blown.
1800 General Wolf, "Maid milking her cow", Page 2:
It was on a fine summer's morning, as birds sweetly sung on each bough,
1829, The Extractor; or Universal repertorium of literature, page 424:
See him dropping from some tall thin bough, […]
1889, George Manville Fenn, Quicksilver: Or, the Boy with No Skid to His Wheel, page 115:
It was done though at last, the thin bough in which the line was tangled seized by the left hand, while the right cut vigorously with the knife. It would have been far easier to have disentangled the line, but […]
