'Mr Watson, come here, I want to see you.'

In, 1629, King Charles I dissolved Parliament and undertook sole rule which would last for a period of eleven years.

Jeremiah Benjamin Richter, the German chemist, was born on this day in 1762.

The artist William Etty would celebrate a birthday today, he was born in  1787.

The first Census was carried out on March the 10th  1801.

The artist William Etty would celebrate a birthday today, he was born in  1787.

On March the 10th 1831 King Louis Philippe established the French Foreign Legion in order to help protect and expand the French Colonial Empire.

Alexander III of Russia was born in this day  in 1845.

As the title suggests, Alexander Graham Bell was to make the first successful telephone call on March 1he 10th 1876. He said to his assistant "Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you.'

On March the 10th  1914 the Canadian suffragette Mary Richardson smuggled a 'chopper'  into the National Gallery and slashed the Rokeby Venus in protest at the arrest the previous day of   Emmeline Pankhurst. Here it is:

Here I quote Mary Richardson ( source , as ever, thanks Wikipedia ).

"I have tried to destroy the picture of the most beautiful woman in mythological history as a protest against the Government for destroying Mrs Pankhurst, who is the most beautiful character in modern history. Justice is an element of beauty as much as colour and outline on canvas. Mrs Pankhurst seeks to procure justice for womanhood, and for this she is being slowly murdered by a Government of Iscariot politicians. If there is an outcry against my deed, let every one remember that such an outcry is an hypocrisy so long as they allow the destruction of Mrs Pankhurst and other beautiful living women, and that until the public cease to countenance human destruction the stones cast against me for the destruction of this picture are each an evidence against them of artistic as well as moral and political humbug and hypocrisy."^[3]

On this day in 1977 the Rings of Uranus were discovered. William Herschel had  reported an observation of rings on Uranus some two hundred years earlier. Have a look here for more: Uranus.


Today is the Feast Day of Saint Simplicius. Born in Tivoli he became Pope of Rome from 468 to 483.


I have friends for lunch today and looking at the beautiful Velazquez gave me the  idea of  Tapas.