Narrator: Three weeks after Jim Hawkins escapes the pirate gang with Billy Bones’treasure map, he arrives in Bristol on a hot Sunday morning. What a city.The gateway to the Oceans of the World. Tea, sugar, cotton, coffee, slaves -aye, slaves - fill the streets and the docks. The great masts of a dozen fleetstower over the quays. Sailors, travellers, the rich and the poor throng thebusy streets all of them hungry for money or food - or adventure.
Jim has a note - he must find a Mr Silver who will show him to the Squire’sship. Jim finds him all right down on the quayside - and there’s a shock, foras he comes up behind the man, he sees he has only one leg. Could this bethe pirate, so feared by Billy Bones?
Jim: Mister… Silver… sir?
Long John Silver: Silver? Long John Silver you be intending to say, I’m sure, and who may yoube?
Narrator: Jim stares up. Tall and strong, with a face as big as a ham, intelligent andsmiling, Long John Silver winks down at him. Jim relaxes - this man’s nopirate.
Jim: Jim Hawkins, sir. Cabin boy to the new ship.
Long John Silver: Is that so?
Jim: Squire Trelawney’s ship. Sir.
Long John Silver: Well, pleased I am to see you my boy. I’m ship’s cook - and now you’recome, we must go aboard. Hop in now.
Narrator: With a graceful turn and a jump, Silver’s down into a little boat, untying therope and preparing to row. Jim joins him - and off they go into the teemingwaters of the docks. Silver rows strongly, the oars biting at the choppy sea,till at last they tie up to a ship - as pretty a schooner as you could ever wantto sail the world in.
Long John Silver: There she is, boy. Your home for the next year - if we’re lucky.
Jim: What’s she called?
Long John Silver: The Hispaniola. Does she please you?
Jim: Wow!
Long John Silver: First voyage?
Jim: First time on a boat, sir!
Squire: Ahoy, Silver!
Long John Silver: I’ll soon make you a pirate, sailor.
Squire: Bravo, young Jim. Welcome aboard! The ship’s company’s complete!
Jim: When do we sail, Mr Trelawney?
Squire: Tonight, my boy, on the midnight tide!
Sailor: Heave, heave ho.
Long John Silver: Up you go…
Jim: Wo-ho!
Sailor: Put yer backs into it, ya bunch of milk-sops!
Narrator: Jim scrambles aboard, finds his hammock and stows his stuff.
Sailor: Mind yer heads you idle dogs!
Narrator: Then he climbs up the rigging to watch the ship being readied.
Sailor: Black powder twenty barrels!
Narrator: Barrels, crates, boxes, chickens…
Sailor: Watch what you’re doing with that goat yer scrawny no good landlubber!
Narrator: …goats - the crew stow everything frantically below decks as the sun sets.
Sailor: Pull lads pull!
Narrator: And what a crew they are: men, women, pigtails, shaven heads, terrifying tattoos, pierced ears and tongues, hooks for hands, wooden arms;the whole lot representing every race, every nation, every colour in theknown world. Squire Trelawney appears at his side.
Squire: What charming chaps they are, don’t you think, young Jim?
Jim: Hello, sir. They look rather frightening to me.
Smollett: Aye, my thoughts entirely.
Squire: Captain Smollett - I don’t care for him. He does go on…
Smollett: I wouldn’t take a single one of those blackguards on a trip like this…
Squire: Told you!
Smollett: But then - I’m just the captain - my voice doesn’t seem to count for verymuch on this matter.
Squire: Now, now, Smollett. Beggars can’t be choosers as you well know. Everyone of these fine sailors has been hand-picked by Long John Silver himself. And as far as I’m concerned the man’s an absolute gem.
Narrator: As if on cue, Long John Silver appears in the hatchway below, grinning.On his shoulder sits a large green parrot, its button eye staring coldly.Silver takes off his hat in an extravagant salute:Long John Silver: If it please you good gentlemen, the provisions is stored and we be allship-shape and ready to cast off. Sir.
Smollett: Thank you, Silver. Prepare to cast off - forward and aft! All ashore who’sgoing ashore!
Sailor: Steady, steady, let her be.
Narrator: Jim breathes deep with excitement, the salt-wind blowing his hair. Behindhim Long John Silver leans against a mast, and nods to himself, smiling.His parrot calls out: ‘Pieces of Eight! Pieces of Eight!’That parrot’s cry would echo in Jim’s dreams for many years to come.
3: Long John Silver and the Hispaniola
Three weeks later Jim arrives in Bristol, with a note to find a Mr Silver who will show him to the Squire's ship.
He finds Silver - Long John Silver - down by the docks. Silver has just one leg.
Silver rows Jim out to the Hispaniola, where the Squire is already waiting on board.
Jim meets Captain Smollett and the other crew members - apparently all hand-picked by Long John Silver himself.
Teacher Notes
This series can be used to increase pupils' familiarity with a broad range of texts and narratives, including myths, legends and traditional stories and to make connections between these and other stories they are familiar with.
It will also support a broad range of writing objectives.
This series is relevant for teaching English at KS2, in England and Wales and Northern Ireland, and at First and Second Level in Scotland.
4. The voyage and the apple barrel. video
The Hispaniola sets sail and Jim becomes friendly on the voyage with the Long John Silver.
5. Escape to the island and Ben Gunn. video
The Squire, Doctor and Captain escape the Hispaniola... under attack from the pirates.
6. The stockade and the pirates attack. video
Jim's friends have taken refuge in an old stockade...but the pirates are advancing.
