A brigantine is, as Greg Stephens correctly defined it, a two-masted sailing ship, with the foremast square-rigged, and the mainmast fore-and-aft rigged. This was sometimes also called a "hermaphrodite brig", or a "jackass brig". However, "jackass" was a british term which referred to any unusual (or experimental) rig, so a "brigantine" might be a "jackass brig" but the reverse ain't necessarily so.

A close relative of the brigantine was the very common "topsail schooner", which had fore-and-aft rig on both (or all) masts, but two or three additional square sails (topsail, topgallant and very occasionally a top-royal) on the foremast. Another was the "barquentine", a three-master with square sails on the foremast, and fore-and-aft sails on the main and mizzen masts.

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Admiral Benbow was famously the man who attained high rank via the hawsehole. Ned Sherrin wrote a book on his life, which unfortunately I cannot now locate, which included the words to several shanties and other songs about him. I shall rummage in my house again for the missing book ...

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A "Tumbleholm" sounds like a mythical island, long since sunk beneath the waves, in the Bristol Channel, just off the village of Y Twmbl.

Like wise, the "Taff rail" is a jeremiad uttered by a Welshman.

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