The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

184
AMAZONIA AND LA PLATA.
the floods, with the Parahyba ; eastwards, with the chain of backwaters on both
sides of Cape S. Thome ; south-westwards, a channel, or rather, a broad ditch,
traversing several other lagoons, carries to the Macahe the overflow of the Lagoa
Feia.
West of the Archipelagoes and peninsular headlands terminating at Cape Frio,
several sheets of water follow along the low-ljing tract comprised between the sea
and the foot of the Serra do Mar. Araruama, largest of these basins, maintains
constant communication with the ocean through a passage north of Cape Frio
giving free access to the tides. But the other lagoons are closed, and after long
Fig. 76.—CiPE Feio.
Scale 1 : 950,000.
42° 50 West or Greenwich
OtolO
Fathoms.
10 to 25
Fathoms.
Depths.
2.'ito50
Fathoms.
, IS
Miles.
50 Fathoms
and upwards.
periods of rain they have to be opened by cuttings in the intervening sandy
cordons. These lagoons might be easily transformed to productive salines, and
they were often used as such even under the Portuguese rule, although in
order to protect the monopoly of the Setubal salines, the extraction of salt was
forbidden by the royal edicts of 1690 and 1691.
The marvellous bay of Rio de Janeiro, " Eiver of January," which has given
its Portuguese name to the Brazilian capital, and which was formerly much more
aptly named Nictheroy, "Hidden Water," by the surrounding Tupi Indians,
belongs in its northern extremity to the type of the coast lagoons. It is, in fact,