Jim is a pirate who’s spent his life roaming the oceans. Born at sea, he has never lived in the same spot. Dull-on-Sea,
and life on land in general, is totally foreign to him; it’s a new world whose conventions are beyond him. He just can’t stand still and, yearning for adventure, he leaps before he looks!
The opposite of Matilda, Jim is all “up front”. He speaks and acts before he thinks and is never scared of a fight… on the contrary! There’s no argument that cannot be resolved by a good old (wooden!) cutlass duel! However, Jim never intends to do any wrong: it’s the others who sometimes see wrong where it doesn’t exist. Matilda is naturally able to understand him and sometimes pleads his case with the other children, which tends to irritate Jim. After all, he has his pirate’s pride and doesn’t consider he needs a freshwater sailor like Matilda to come to his defence!