Treasure Island has a lot of interesting notes in it: the squire, top of the heap socially and friends with the top law officer, is prejudiced against people of color and against women. He’s a bachelor who loves to talk and doesn’t realize that people lower down the totem pole listen to undermine him. The pirates are fully aware that if the squire and the doctor get the treasure back to England, they, the very sailors who brought it, won’t get more than a token amount. The doctor talks a good game about giving a large share to Jim Hawkins, but the squire will want the cost of the ship, hiring the crew, and all the supplies, plus an ample reward, before anyone else gets any. The doctor will receive a much smaller reward, and whatever is given to Jim will be put in trust for him by the doctor and the squire. Jim won’t see much of it at all, not until he reaches the age of majority. Even then, they’ll put him in school and keep the actual money in investments. Some of it will go to whatever solicitor they retain for him. All this is before the sailors get anything beyond wages.

The only reason there is a treasure to find, is because the pirates took it and hid it. Which, if you think about it, is crazy. Who wouldn’t use the money to live it up, or as Silver did, invest and put it to work in business? It’s possible the original pirate crew hid it because they had captured a Spanish treasure ship and had more than they could safely carry away. It’s also possible that with navigation an esoteric art, nobody could find it again in the meantime. The pirates who are left searching for it, are the ones who had little to begin with, and lost that in trying to fill the hole that is ignorance and poverty. It’s natural to find reasons they’re broke: drinking, gambling, whoring, opium, thieving; those are choices, yes. But also: desperation.

They see the squire with a huge house and servants and plenty of meat to eat. They see the doctor, educated, respected, knowledgeable; people listen when he talks, and not to laugh or jeer at him. They see Jim Hawkins, an honest boy with youth and good health and the favor of powerful people. They know the squire and the doctor mean to make Jim an educated man, a powerful man. They envy Jim. They want the power that comes with money. They want control of their own fate in a world that considers seamen replaceable.