Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
ancial markets of Europe and America. They also brought wool. The
great sailing ships raced each other to get the fleece back to the auc-
tions held between January and March. For merchants supplying the
busy Yorkshire mills it was a highly profitable trade. But of all car-
goes wool was the one sailors hated most.
You can dunnage casks o' tallow; you can handle hides an' horn;
You can carry frozen mutton; you can lumber sacks o' corn; But the
queerest kind o' cargo that you've got to haul and pull Is Australia's
'staple product' - is her God-abandoned wool. For it's greasy an' it's
stinkin', an' them awkward, ugly bales Must be jammed as close as her-
rings in a ship afore she sails.
For it's twist the screw and turn it,
And the bit you get you earn it;
You can take the tip from me, sir, that it's anything but play
When you're layin' on the screw,
When you're draggin' on the screw,
In the summer, under hatches, in the middle o' the day.
G. J. Brady
The wool was 'screwed' into the hold; that is the bales, com-
pressed by hydraulic presses, were packed in as tight as possible. It
was a hot, smelly cargo - and dangerous. Bales could expand, break
their lashings and put enormous pressure on a ship's timbers. Worse
still, they could overheat and catch fire because of water trapped
within them. Several ships were lost because of such spontaneous
combustion. The most famous was the Lightning .
In 1869 she was loading at Geelong when fire broke out in
the forward hold. The flames spread so rapidly that the crew could
not steer her away from the jetty and she swung round her anchor
 
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