Stevenson hoped that this story would please young people. It was, he explained, a story of sailors, storms and adventures, heat and cold, sailing-ships, islands, pirates and buried gold - all told in the old way. It is the story of the bloodthirsty and hard-hearted Captain Flint who, on his deathbed in 1754, drew the map of an island where he had buried his treasure - seven hundred thousand pounds in silver and gold.