The Old Sea Dog
The opening of Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, adapted for audio.
Squire Trelawney, Doctor Livesey, and the rest of these gentlemen have asked me to write down about Treasure Island, from the beginning to the end. My name is Jim Hawkins and my story starts in the year 1757, when I was thirteen years old
At that time my family lived in a remote cove on the Cornish coast. My father was the innkeeper of the “Admiral Benbow”.
Few people visited but one morning an old seaman arrived…
I remember him as if it were yesterday.
He came plodding to the inn door, his sea-chest following behind him in a hand-barrow. He was a tall, strong, heavy, nut-brown man, with a pigtail falling over the shoulder of his soiled blue coat. His hands were rough and scarred, with black, broken nails. Across one cheek was a thick white scar.
Looking all around the cove, he whistled to himself as he rapped on the door with a stick that he carried. Then he began singing that old sea-song — the one he sang so often afterwards:
Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest — Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!
When my father appeared, he said, “Give me a glass of rum.”
The seaman drank his rum slowly, still looking all around him, at the cliffs and up at our signboard.
“Nice grog-shop you’ve got here, mate,” he told my father. “How’s business?”
“Not good,” said my father. “We don’t get many guests.”
“Well, then,” said he, “I’ll stay here a bit.”
“How long were you thinking of-”
The seaman threw down three or four gold pieces on the threshold. “You can tell me when I’ve worked through that,” he said.
“Right. And -”
“I’m a plain man,” interrupted the seaman. Despite his rough appearance and dirty clothes it was clear that he was used to giving orders. “Rum and bacon and eggs is what I want. And a room at the top to watch the ships from.”
“And your name, sir?”
“Just call me captain.”
We soon learned the captain’s routine. All day he hung round the cove or upon the cliffs with a brass telescope. all evening he sat in a corner of the parlour next the fire and drank rum and water
Mostly, he did not speak, even when spoken to. We soon learned to let him be. Every day when he came back from his stroll he would ask: “Have you seen any other seaman around today?”
At first we assumed that the captain was looking for the company of other sailors. After a while I learned that the opposite was true.
One day he took me aside. “Want to earn yourself a silver coin on the first day of every month?”
Of course I did.
“Keep your ‘weather eye’ open for a seafaring man with one leg. Let me know the first moment he appears.”
So on the first of every month I asked for my wage. Often he would just blow through his nose and stare at me down. But he always brought me my silver coin within the week.
And he always repeated his orders to look out for “the seafaring man with one leg.” This man came to haunt my dreams.
On stormy nights, when the wind shook the four corners of the house and the surf roared along the cove, I would see that monstrous creature in a thousand forms. In my worst nightmares he would leap and run and pursue me over hedges and ditches.
It was a high price for my monthly silver coin. But I was far less afraid of the captain than anybody else who knew him.
On nights when he drank too much rum he sang his old sea-songs. Often I heard the house shaking with Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum
Sometimes he would force everyone to listen to his stories. Slapping his hand on the table for silence, he would not allow anyone to leave the inn till he had drunk himself sleepy and reeled off to bed.
His dreadful stories frightened people most. They told of hanging, and walking the plank, and storms at sea. The captain had lived his life among some of the wickedest men in the world.
“He’ll scare our customers away,” my father said but I think the captain did us good. Secretly people rather liked these blood-curdling tales. They brought excitement to our quiet country life.
In one way, though, the captain did damage us. By staying on week after week, and then month after month, he used up the money he had given us. My father never had the heart to insist on him paying more. If ever did mentioned money, the captain would forced my poor father out of the room with his snorts and stares and roars.
All the time he lived with us the captain always wore the same clothes. He patched his old coat in his room- in the end it was nothing but patches. He never wrote or received a letter or spoke to anyone outside of our inn.
None of us had seen his great sea chest open. Was it the ‘dead man’s chest’ the captain sang about. It always appeared so in my nightmares.
My father’s health continued to get worse. One late afternoon Doctor Livsey came to see him. From the bar came the sound of
Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest — Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum.
The two men then met on the stairs, where the captain glared at the doctor.
“I have only one thing to say to you, sir,” said the doctor. “Keep on drinking rum like this and you will soon be dead!”
The old fellow’s fury was awful. He sprang to his feet, drew and opened a sailor’s clasp-knife. “I’ll pin you to the wall!” he roared.
The doctor remained unmoved. Speaking in a calm, steady voice, he said “If you do not put that knife in your pocket, you shall hang at the next assizes.”
Then followed a battle of looks between them, but the captain soon knuckled under. He put away his weapon, grumbling like a beaten dog.
My complete adapted version — with text, audio, teaching materials & links to the original. You can also find the original text here — all free to access.
