The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (491 page)

see
RED sky at night shepherd's delight
.

 
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c
1518
tr.
Mancinus' Mirror of Good Manners
G4
^V
An old tre transposed shall fynde smal auauntage.
1670
English Proverbs
22
Remove an old Tree, and it will wither to death.
1721
Scottish Proverbs
284
Remove an old Tree, and it will wither. Spoken by a Man who is loth to leave a Place in his advanc'd years, in which he has long lived.
1831
Political & Occasional Poems
(1888) 166
I'm near three-score; you ought to know You can't transplant so old a tree.
1906
Puck of Pook's Hill
259
‘
You
've cleaved to your own parts pretty middlin’ close, Ralph.' ‘Can't shift an old tree ‘thout it dyin'.’
habit
;
old age

 
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see
happy is the BRIDE that the sun shines on
;
MAKE hay while the sun shines
.

 
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see
the SUN loses nothing by shining into a puddle
.

 
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Ship
is a dialectal pronunciation of
sheep
, and the original literal sense of the proverb was ‘do not allow sheep to die for the lack of a trifling amount of tar’, tar being used to protect sores an wounds on sheep from flies.
Hog
(quots. 1623 and 1670) seems to have been understood by Ray (quot. 1670 note) as a swine, but it was also a widely used dialect term for a young sheep older than a lamb but before its first shearing. The current form of this proverb was standard by the mid-nineteenth century. The metaphorical phrase
to spoil the ship for a ha'porth of tar
is also found.
1623
Remains concerning Britain
(ed. 3) 265
A man will not lose a hog, for a halfeperth [halfpennyworth] of tarre.
1631
Advertisements for Planters
XIII
. 30
Rather .. lose ten sheepe, than be at the charge of halfe penny worth of Tarre.
1670
English Proverbs
103
Ne're lose a hog for a half-penny-worth of tarre [(ed. 2) 154 Some have it, lose not a sheep, &c. Indeed tarr is more used about sheep than swine].
1861
Cloister & Hearth
I. i.
Never tyne [lose] the ship for want of a bit of tar.
1869
English Proverbs
432
To spoil the ship for a halfpennyworth of tar. In Cornwall, I heard a different version, which appeared to me to be more consistent with probability: ‘Don't spoil the sheep for a ha'porth of tar.’
1910
Spectator
19 Feb. 289
The ratepayers .. are accused of .. cheeseparing, of spoiling the ship for a ha'p'orth of tar.
1980
Marsh Blood
iii.
Well, he says, don't want to spoil the ship for a ha'porth of tar and could come in useful having the extra private bath.
meanness

 
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