> as lemmas

1797 Monthly Mag. 3 246 They soon found a fox, who..saved himself by running to ground.

1801 W. B. Daniel Rural Sports I. 90 In deep Snow, Foxes will lie at ground.

1801 W. B. Daniel Rural Sports I. 91 When a Fox goes to ground, after a long chase..With respect to the digging of Foxes which hounds run to ground.

1860 G. D. Prentice Prenticeana 175 A Party of our friends..chased a fox thirty-six hours. They actually ‘ran the thing into the ground’.

1871 H. B. Stowe My Wife & I ix. 93 Show me up the weak points of those reformers; raise a laugh at those temperance men,—those religionists, who, like all us poor human trash, are running religion, and morals, and progress into the ground.

1900 Daily News 23 Oct. 6/2 The British infantrymen watched the race for shelter, their sporting spirit rising..above all racial hatred, and hailing with a ‘gone to ground’ whoop the final disappearance of the gun.

1905 F. C. Loder-Symonds & E. P. Crowdy Hist. Old Berks Hunt xv. 292 Hatford. Gorse, where they soon marked him [the fox] to ground.

1920 A. C. Smith Dog 18 Strictly speaking..Airedales and bull terriers should not be classified among the terriers, both being much too big to go to ground.

1925 Times 7 Jan. 5/6 Sticking to their fox, the pace continued good to Chesterton, where he was marked to ground.

1930 ‘Sapper’ Finger of Fate 265 It so happens that on occasions members of the fraternity [sc. snakes] go to ground in the bunches of fruit as they lie stacked beside the railway line.

1931 Our Dogs 23 Oct. 292/2 Working Terrier Dog..goes to ground to fox or badger, and stays.

1964 Ann. Reg. 1963 326 The four men ‘went to ground’, probably in Johannesburg.

1968 K. Weatherly Roo Shooter 39 When they found where a fox had been caught they would track it, sometimes for miles, and shoot it, but often the fox would go to ground and another trap was lost.

1968 Times 11 May 4/6 They are looking for a suburban villa where they can go to ground.