Thus the career of the noted outlaws, the James Boys, was commenced, under auspices fully as favorable as fell to the fortune of any of the boys of their own age, in their country home. And so the years rolled on, and the boys were approaching the estate of manhood; while fate was shaping them to perform a part in those troublous times, of which they dreamed not in the days of boyhood. One of the sisters of Frank and Jesse died just as she was approaching the estate of womanhood. She is represented as having been a beautiful and amiable child, who was called away from the world while life was still beautiful and all the promises of the future bright. Miss Susan James was arrested with her mother in the early part of the war and confined in the jail at St. Joseph for several months. Afterward she went to Nebraska and remained there for more than a year. She married a gentleman named Parmer, several years ago, and with her husband, resided for a time in Sherman, Texas. From that place she removed to Henriette, and was living there in 1879. Mrs. Samuels had an eight year old son killed in January, 1875, when the detectives attacked the Samuels' house. A daughter, a half sister of Frank and Jesse, remains unmarried, and resides with Dr. and Mrs. Samuels. CHAPTER II. FRANK AND JESSE. "There will be storms In causeless, strange abuse, and the strong breath Of busy mouths will blow upon our course." Of prophecy, many have a doubt. And yet there are prophecies from simple lips, and warnings from babes and sucklings, which if we could but interpret aright, might assist us to change the whole currents of life in a fellow being. Deeper than fear or doubting men are thrown into the great vortex of the world's thought and actions. What fortune or fate shall come to them, no one can tell. Every billow in that maelstrom seeks its own wild independence; and the shores of that tumultuous deep--which we call human society--are strewn along with the dull wrecks of what were once glorious schemes--the bright day dreams--once borne buoyantly upon the topmost waves. These, and myriads of other schemes and hopes, are at last remanded to lie under the dark waters of the Sea of Fate, hidden so completely that no thought of man shall ever again recall them to memory. It is perhaps best so. It would be equivalent to the expulsion of all the joys of life to have opened before us the book of the future, wherein is recorded the deeds which must be performed, and the sorrows which shall fall, dark and impenetrable--extinguishing every scintillation of joyous hope.