(Ang. Sax. facen, fraud, trick, deceit.) A trick, or invention to deceive.--Grose. This word is in several of the English glossaries. In the United States it is never heard except colloquially.
An envious neighbor is easy to find,
His cumbersome fetches are seldom behind;
His fetch is to flatter, to get what he can;
His purpose once gotten, a pin for thee then.--Tusser, Husb.
It is a fetch of wit;
You laying these slight sullies on my son,
As 'twere a thing a little soil'd i' th' working.--Shakspeare.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Francis Grose
To stop suddenly. This sense of the word is not noticed in the English dictionaries, nor by Webster....
Dictionary of American Words And Phrases by John Russell Bartlett.