The steeving of hides (Dana) was a lot different than screwing cotton bales, kinesthetically.

The significance, for me, is that they are both steeving labors and Dana's repertoire of songs the actual man hours spent work-singing while steeving appear to have been qualitatively and quantitatively different than the work-singing under sail at that time/place. Suggesting how the newer brand of songs was coming via stevedores (and boat-rowers) more so than past deepwater tradition.

Dana's crew was still working with the handspike windlass, and the "heave ho's" endemic to it. A year after his voyage, that would start to change ("Sally Brown" at Tyzack and Dobinson's patent windlass). One of the notable things about Dana's experience is how his repertoire appears to have gotten phased out so quickly in the next decade.

I was just in Dana's area last weekend, looking at the cliffs and imagining the hides being tossed down to the beach.
No news on what might replace the sunken _Pilgrim_ replica.
Somewhere, I forget where I saw it -- one of the area's missions, I think -- has a dried hide on display as an aid to tell the story.