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Bert leeched hundreds of files from the BBS, but never uploaded anything in return.
1992, AfricAsia, 2 (1): 12:
Guinea is also blocking Strasser's efforts to stop illegal fishing in Sierra Leone's territorial waters and the smuggling of gold and diamonds, which leech hundreds of millions of dollars from the country's economy.
As if an expert leech must needs be expert in the physicks (that is, in those speculations which concerne the workes of nature) the nearest word to fall with our tongue, yet not farre from the thing, was physitian.
Thus virtuous Orsin was endued / With learning, conduct, fortitude / Incomparable; and as the prince / Of poets, Homer, sung long since, / A skilful leech is better far, / Than half a hundred men of war [...]
1807, George Crabbeː, (Please provide the book title or journal name):
Can this proud leech, with all his boasted skill, / Amend the soul or body, wit or will?
For the sake of the minister’s health, and to enable the leech to gather plants with healing balm in them, they took long walks on the seashore or in the forest; mingling various talk with the plash and murmur of the waves, and the solemn wind anthem among in treetops.
1992, Hilary Mantel, A Place of Greater Safety, Harper Perennial, published 2007, page 11:
He coughed sputum stained with blood, and a scraping, crackling noise came from his chest, quite audible to anyone in the room. ‘Lungs possibly not too good,’ the leech said.
1900, Augustus Henry Keane, Man, Past and Present, Cambridge: The University Press:
Their functions are threefold, those of the medicine-man (the leech, or healer by supernatural means); of the soothsayer (the prophet through communion with the invisible world); and of the priest, especially in his capacity as exorcist
In ancient times runesters were a specialized class separate from that of the witch or ordinary spell caster (much as the other specialists such as the leech or healer and the seithkona were different from a witch), and even today many believe it takes years of training to become adept at using the runes in spell work.
2003, Brian Froud, Ari Berk, The Runes of Elfland, Pavillion Books, →ISBN, page 22:
"Leech?" "Not another doctor".
2004, Runic John, The Book of Seidr, Capall Bann Publishing, →ISBN, page 282:
There are many kinds of "Leech" or "healer" as there are healing techniques, some are more powerful than others and some are very specific to certain illnesses and complaints; some use potions and unguents, others crystals and stones, others galdr and some work their healing from within the hidden realms themselves.
To one man (that) broke his leg in Strivelin … Item to the man that leecheth him.
1707, J[ohn] Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving of Land., 2nd edition, London: J H for H Mortlock, and J Robinson, published 1708, →OCLC:
though there are many Pretenders to the Art of Farriering and Cow-leeching, yet many of them are very ignorant , especially in the Countrie
1984, Sven Donaldson, A Sailor's Guide to Sails, page 130:
To help combat these problems, almost all sailmakers trim the leeches of their headsails to a hollow or concave profile and enclose a LEECHLINE within the leech tabling.
From Middle High Germanlīht, from Proto-Germanic*linhtaz. The form shows shortening before -ht followed by later lengthening in the same position (cf. the same in Luxembourgishliicht). The Colognian form leich is probably influenced by Standard German (reinforced by analogy with words where Colognian has -ei- for other Ripuarian -ee-, from Middle High German -ei-).
Jacob Poole (d. 1827) (before 1828) William Barnes, editor, A Glossary, With some Pieces of Verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, London: J. Russell Smith, published 1867, page 52