There is an old saying that “opportunity knocks but once” upon our door. This is not true. Opportunities will certainly continue to come to us. The important thing is to be ready for them when they come. We never know what incident may turn out to be our greatest opportunity. If we will do our best to meet every situation that confronts us, we may be sure that there will be plenty of opportunities for us. It is the boy that does not do his best on all occasions that loses out. So Washington, when invited to speak at Hampton commencement, worked hard for three months preparing that speech. When the time came, he did his very best. Then he forgot the matter and went home. Just a few days after he got home, he had a great surprise. There came a letter to him from General Armstrong. It said, “We need you here at Hampton. We want you to come and help us run the school.” That was a very happy moment in the life of Washington. He thought more of General Armstrong than of any other man in the world. To be asked by this man to come and work for him made Washington an exceedingly happy man. He immediately wrote that he would accept the position. Some weeks later he reached Hampton, ready to enter upon his new duties. His job was a rather peculiar one. The Indians in the United States, who had been put upon certain territories out West, after being taken from their land in the South and Southwest, had no system of education and were entirely without schools of any kind. General Armstrong wanted to help them. He said he believed that they could be educated, and he wanted to try it. The Government of the United States gave its consent and agreed to cooperate with him. They brought from the West to Hampton about one hundred Indian boys to be educated. These boys were very ignorant; Booker Washington says that they were almost wild. Washington’s task was to live in the same building with these Indian boys and look after them—to be a sort of “house father” to them. He had a hard job. The Indians are a very proud people. They felt themselves superior to the white race, as well as to the black race. They had a special dislike for the negro because he had been a slave, and the Indians would not be slaves; they preferred death to slavery. These boys were not only very ignorant, but it was very hard to make them understand, as they did not know the English language well. Furthermore, everybody expected them to fail.