Jim's headed off to the port of Bristol, from where the good ship Hisapaniola is due to set sail in search of buried treasure. With the help of a strange, one-legged man claiming to be a cook who just wants to go on one last voyage, Squire Trelawney has been able to put together a ship's crew. Unbeknownst to the Squire, the one-legged man—Long John Silver, of course—is a notorious pirate, as indeed are all the shipmates he's helped to recruit.

Not long after Jim arrives in Bristol, Squire Trelawney instructs him to go to the Spy-glass inn and deliver a note to Long John Silver. When Jim first claps eyes on Silver, he's worried that he might be the same one-legged man that the captain back at the Admiral Benbow was so afraid of. But Silver seems like such a jolly, amiable soul that Jim's convinced that he can't be the same man.

In this particular scene, we see another side of Silver's personality. As well as being a greedy, ruthless cutthroat, he's also a man of considerable charm who manages to convince the Squire, Jim, and countless others that he's basically a decent, harmless individual.