finding more cultivated plants(27).
Three years later, the privileged vision of the young engi-
neer Henrique Luiz de Niemeyer Bellegarde will provide a detailed
description of the physical and various aspects of the northern
region of Rio de Janeiro. Among restinga lagoons surveyed by
him are Campelo, Carapebus, Jurubatiba and the Imboacica la-
goons. He informs that the road from São João da Barra to Ni-
terói, passing through Barra do Furado, was abandoned and in
disuse. Then, the road that prevailed passed through the north
of the Feia Lagoon. From Quissamã to Macaé, there were two
roads: one crossed Campos dos Sabões, passing by the beach-
es of Paulistas and Carapebus, towards Jurubatiba. This is the
coast road. The other road, not far from the first, also started in
Campos dos Sabões, in the town of Olhos d’Água, where Muniz
de Souza had passed, crossed Carrapato farm, crossed Carra-
pato River and Carapebus lagoon, followed to Conceição Ham-
let towards Caixetas and ended at Jurubatiba. The coastal road
had the inconvenience of getting flooded in the rainy season,
obstructed by dunes soaked by floods of the lagoons of Paulis-
tas’ beach and, mainly, by the opening of the bars. Moreover, the
heat of the sun reflected in the white sands made the road un-
bearable. The reports by Muniz de Souza and Bellegarde show
that the virginity of the area of the present Jurubatiba National
Park was once considerably maculated for economic purposes
and largely crossed by travelers.
In a rapid passage through the northern restinga, com-
ing from Espirito Santo, the Swiss Baron JJ Tschudi made brief
notes on the “beach barren sand dunes,” further reinforcing the
view of the restingas as erratic and useless lands, in the con-
frontation with the alluvial plain, tableland and the hill(29).
In the second half of the nineteenth century, the Cana-
dian geologist Charles Frederick Hartt attempted to describe
geomorphologically many Brazilian formations, dividing his re-
search by provinces. He notes
To the north of Macaé, the tertiary plains
move rapidly away from the coast, run-
ning towards Campos, on the Paraíba
do Sul River, the lands bordering the
coast are flat, more or less marshy and
interspersed with numerous shallow la-
goons, some of them of considerable ex-
tension(30).Hartt mentions the predominance of the northeast wind
on northern Fluminense coast and the dangerousness of Cape
of São Tomé for navigation. Manifesting some misunderstand-
ing on the information at that time, he makes Macaé River ends
at Feia lagoon. It also refers to several lagoons, among them
Açu, still known as the Iguaçu River, Campelo River and several
others along the left bank of Paraíba do Sul River, towards the
Guaxindiba beach. Later, the scientist reports an arm linked to
Itabapoana River that was considered up to date. Actually, it is
a narrow and shallow channel or lagoon, in Hartt words, that is
born in the Itabapoana River and drifts southwards the shore,
behind the beach crest, where a mangrove develops(30).One of the most eloquent sources about restingas, in
the nineteenth century, is represented by cartography. In 1839,
Conrad Jacob de Niemeyer, Henrique Luiz de Niemeyer Belle-
garde, Julio Frederico Koeler and Carlos Rivierre joined forces to
gather information collected by themselves and others provided
by Roussin, Miranda and Brito, Xavier de Brito, Andrea, Cordeiro
and Couto Reis, in order to the engineer Pedro de Taulois draw
the Chorographic Letter of Rio de Janeiro Province. It is possible
to see in it several coastal lagoons between Macaé and Barra do
Furado, such as Comprida, Geribatiba (Jurubatiba), Carapebus,
Campelo and Sul (currently Ribeira, at that time directly linked to
Feia lagoon). Between the Cape of São Tomé and Manguinhos
beach, the cartographers recorded Salgada, Bananeiras, Grussaí
and Campelo lagoons. As in the letter of Couto Reis, from 1785,
it is surprisingly seen a geographic configuration quite different
from the present one. Between the alluvial plain and the north
restinga, for example, there was a water course that was born in
the Paraíba River and flowed to Iguaçu River, adding its waters
together with five defluents of Feia lagoon, already mentioned,
and creating conditions for the permanent or semi-permanent
opening of Barra do Açu. This was the old Rio Doce. Another
line of lagoons interconnected by channels ran farther inland,
merging into the old Cula channel or Córrego Grande, signaled
by Couto Reis, to also flow down into the Iguaçu basin(31).Clearly taking advantage of this cartographic baseline,
Viscount J. deVilliers de L'Ile Adam published in 1846 the Coro-
graphic and Administrative Letter of the Province of Rio de Ja-
neiro Neutral Municipality. The similarities with the letter from
1839 are flagrant, but this one adds new details, which the most
conspicuous one is the unfinished Campos-Macaé channel. In
addition to the Comprida, Geribatiba, Carapebus and Campelo
lagoons, in the southern restinga, the author includes the vast
field of Jaguaraba, south of Feia lagoon and its perpendicular
arm called, at that time, Sul lagoon. In the northern restinga, it is
possible to see the lagoons Salgada, Bananeiras, Taim Grande,
Urucai (Grussaí), Campo Belo (certainly Campelo, but confusing
it with another one) and several others unnamed. As in the pre-
vious letter, the Guaxindiba River deserves special mention, as
well as the two lagoons connected by channels to the Iguaçu
river basin(32).