Manuel Marques de Sousa, Count of Porto Alegre (1804–1875) was an army officer, politician, abolitionist and monarchist of the Empire of Brazil. For most of the 1820s, he joined the struggle for Brazilian independence and then fought in the Cisplatine War. From 1835 to 1845, his native province of Rio Grande do Sul was engulfed in a secessionist rebellion, the Ragamuffin War, which he helped to suppress. In 1852, he led an army division during the Platine War, invading the Argentine Confederation and overthrowing its dictator. Porto Alegre was elected to the legislature of Rio Grande do Sul, and founded the provincial Progressive-Liberal Party—a coalition of Liberals like himself and some members of the Conservative Party. He later entered the lower house of the Brazilian parliament and was briefly Minister of War. After returning to the military as one of the chief Brazilian commanders during the Paraguayan War (1864), he became an active advocate for the abolition of slavery and a patron in the fields of literature and science. Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manuel_Marques_de_Sousa,_Count_of_Porto_Alegre> _______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries: 1638: Construction began in Delhi on the Red Fort, the residence of the Mughal emperors, now an iconic symbol of India. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Fort> 1779: Russian and French mediators negotiated the Treaty of Teschen to end the War of the Bavarian Succession. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_Bavarian_Succession> 1917: Ten-year-old Lúcia Santos (pictured middle) and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto reportedly began experiencing a Marian apparition near Fátima, Portugal, now known as Our Lady of Fátima. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_F%C3%A1tima> 1981: Mehmet Ali Ağca shot and critically wounded Pope John Paul II in Saint Peter's Square, Vatican City. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_II_assassination_attempt> 1992: Li Hongzhi introduced Falun Gong in a public lecture in Changchun, Jilin province, China. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Hongzhi> _____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day: prahok: A salted and fermented fish paste used in Cambodian cuisine. <https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/prahok> ___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:   To struggle against the dreamers who dream ugliness, be they men or gods, cannot but be the will of the Nameless. This struggle will also bear suffering, and so one's karmic burden will be lightened thereby, just as it would be by enduring the ugliness; but this suffering is productive of a higher end in the light of the eternal values of which the sages so often speak.   --Lord of Light <https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Lord_of_Light>