Cargoes

[bunn]

Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir,
Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine,
With a cargo of ivory,
And apes and peacocks,
Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.

Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus,
Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores,
With a cargo of diamonds,
Emeralds, amethysts,
Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.

Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack,
Butting through the Channel in the mad March days,
With a cargo of Tyne coal,
Road-rails, pig-lead,
Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays.

And it struck me that presumably when written (which seems to have been around 1902, according to google, odd, I would have guessed a bit later) the feel of the poem was of change, it went Poetic - > Gritty/Realistic.

Whereas now it's kind of all poetic, only with different flavours - Tyne coal, carried by a little coaster with a smoke-stack, how quaint. Pig-lead? What is pig-lead, it sounds marvellously Victorian? And I can remember tin trays, but do they still exist? All of ours are some sort of moulded resin...

I think it needs another verse. I had a go at one while walking the hounds but I had nothing to write it down on so I will have to have another go - Anyone else fancy having a go?

Comments

[chainmailmaiden]

I remember when we were read this poem at school we were told pig lead was lead that had been poured into moulds that had 4 little feet, so when it was turned out it stood on legs a bit like a pig (or cow/sheep/dog/cat...). Of course this could be complete b*ll*cks, I never bothered to confirm it. Incidentally, there is quite a good metal band called Pig Iron :-)

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Pigs of lead go back at least to Roman times - it's just the name for the ingots they were formed into, but no little feet, no curly tail, no tempting aroma of bacon ...

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

I presume 'pig-lead' is pigs (i.e. small blocks) of lead, in the same way pig-iron is small blocks of iron. (The origin of the phrase being that the square moulds are laid in parallel lines, with a feed trough from the smelter down the middle, and runnels to each mould. The overall effect being of piglets feeding at the trough or, if you have a lot of imagination, from their mother.)

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

Apologies for shocking stereotypes and dodgy rhyme:

Ugly metal ferry boat returning from the booze cruise,
Heading back to Dover from the shops of France,
With a cargo of stag nights,
Fake tans, vomiting,
Duty-free and immigrants in old white vans.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

It's very good, though :-)

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Excellent :-D

Pig-lead

[sigisgrim.livejournal.com]

I would assume that it is similar to pig iron.

Wikipedia doesn't recognise it. However a Google search throws up this: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/pig+lead

lead that is cast in pigs

Pig iron is iron that has only got so far in the refining process. It has been mealted (probably straight out of the ore) and collected at the base of the smelter in groves where it cools and hardens and ends up looking like a mother pig suckling a line piglets. This is a convenient arrangement for the men dealing with it; the mother pig is the grove where the molten iron runs and the piglets are the larger indentations where the bulk of the iron is collected.

It is easier to understand with a diagram, but I'm having difficulty finding one. I got to page 10 of a Google image search and gave up. :-(

Re: Pig-lead

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Yes, I know about iron being made in pigs, and was assuming that pig-lead was probably something along the same lines. What I was trying to say I suppose, is that lead is no longer a day to day sort of thing, and that I don't instinctively know if pig-lead is a particular sort of lead, or a particular way of dividing or delivering it or what.

It seems a strange, exotic term, not the dull, mundane name that it was when it was used in the poem, and I would guess, is probably not imported as a raw material, as pig-lead in fact, much - those who need lead probably mostly get it machined somewhere cheaper and import the finished product.