Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/583

Rh E I K I O 563 II. (which is well organized), national museum, institute of history, geography, and ethnology (1838), polytechnic institute, national educational museum, polytechnic school, military, naval, and normal schools, lyceum of arts, musical conservatory, geographical society, and astronomical and meteorological observatory deserve special mention. The great national library owes its foundation to the bequest of Joao VI., and now numbers upwards of 120,000 volumes open to the public daily (see LIBRARIES, vol. xiv. p. 530, where the lesser libraries are also mentioned). One of the pleasant features of the city is the abundant supply of excellent water distributed to numerous stately fountains in the streets and public squares. The chief aqueduct, begun in the middle of the 17th century, starts at Tijuca, about 12 miles distant, and crosses the valley (740 feet wide and 90 feet deep) between Monte de Santa Theresa and Monte de Santo Antonio by a beautiful double tier of arches (erected in 1750), which form a striking feature in some of the finest views of the city. Its entire length being covered in with stone work, the water is kept remark- ably cool. As the city has extended, other aqueducts of less architectural pretensions have had to be constructed ; and a good deal has been done by an English company in recent years to provide a proper system of sewers. The bay of Rio de Janeiro has been the subject of poetic panegyric ever since it was discovered ; and the traveller who comes to it after a voyage round the world seems as susceptible to its charm as if it were his first tropical experience. 1 The actual entrance, between Fort St Juan and Fort Santa Cruz, is 1700 yards wide. Within there are fifty square miles of anchorage, or even more for vessels of light draught, the bay having a width varying from 2 to 7 miles and stretching inland from the sea for 16 miles. Its coast-line, neglecting minor indentations, measures 60 miles. Such a sheet of water would be beautiful anywhere ; but, when on all sides it is surrounded by hills of the most varied contour, the beauty is enhanced a thousandfold. Its surface is broken by a large num- ber of islands from the Ilha do Governador (6 miles long and 2 broad; population 2500) down to the little cluster of the Jerubahibas. Rio is the seat of the principal arsenal in the empire, and most of the Brazilian cruisers have been built in its dockyards. The roadstead for vessels of war is between Villegagnon Island, with its fort, and the islands at the north-east angle of the town called respectively Ilha das Cobras (Snake Island) and Ilha dos Katos (Rat Island). On the north side of Ilha das Cobras is the naval arsenal with two large docks. On Ilha das Enchadas (Coaling Island) there is a fine commercial dock 385 feet long, on keel blocks, 45 feet wide at the entrance and 23 feet deep. Between 1846 and 1855 the average number of vessels that cleared from the port of Rio was over 680 with an average total burden of 221,280 tons. In 1867 1311 vessels (522,407 tons) entered and 1032 (596,663 tons) cleared ; in 1883 1218 (1,220,330 tons) entered and 1067 cleared, while, besides, the coasting trade was represented by 1414 vessels (454,739) entering. England has the greatest share of the foreign shipping trade, Germany ranking next, and France third. How completely (in spite of the fact that Santos and Rio Grande have become more independent) Rio de Janeiro is the commercial as well as the political capital of Brazil is evident from the fact that the exports from Rio are on the average fully equal in value to those from the rest of Brazil ; for instance, the value of the exports from the capital in 1859-60 was 5,933,850 out of 11,826,121 from the empire, in 1879-80 10,566,800 out of 18,928,635, and in 1881-82 7,550,966 out of 1 "This bay," says Mr Gallenga, "is the very gate to a tropical paradise. There is nowhere so bold a coast, such a picturesque cluster of mountains, such a maze of inlets and outlets, such a burst of all- pervading vegetation. The city itself is like Lima or Buenos Ayres, a mere chess-board of shabby narrow streets. But the environs all round the Botafogo Bay, the vale of Larangerias, the height of Tejuca, San Cristoval, Santa Teresa, and others .... may well challenge comparison with any of the loveliest localities of either hemisphere. You are bidden drive out to the Botanic Gardens (at Botafogo), but the whole road inland or along the water is nothing but a continuous garden. " 18, 522,050. To this large total coffee has long contributed 40-50 per cent., and in 1880-81 (an exceptional year) the ratio rose to 86 per cent. Though the coffee plant was not introduced till 1770, Brazil is the greatest coffee-producing country in the world, and Rio de Janeiro is consequently the largest coffee-exporting city. The other exports of moment are brandy (in decreasing quantities), sugar, hides, diamonds, tapioca (mainly to France), tobacco and cigars, medicinal herbs, gold dust, and jacaranda, rosewood, and other timbers. The imports comprise cotton goods, machinery, pitch pine, and petroleum. Among the comparatively few local industries are the weaving of coloured buckskins (by a German firm) and other woollen and half woollen stuffs, the extensive manufacture of artificial mineral waters and liquors, brewing, carriage-building, and hat-making. Rio de Janeiro is the terminus of the .Dom Pedro II. Railway, and thus of nearly the whole railway system of the country ; and it communicates regularly by steamer with Nitherohi on the other side of the bay, which is the terminus of another line. The population of the municipality of Rio de Janeiro was in 1850 stated at 266,466, of which 205,906 were in the town proper ; but this, like most of the earlier figures, appears to be an exaggeration, as the census in 1872 gave only 274,972, of which about 190,000 were in the town and suburbs, the slaves numbering 48,939 and the foreigners (mainly Germans, French, and Italians) 84,279. The Italian element has been rapidly increasing. The bulk of the population is Portuguese with a mixture of Negro blood. The native Indian races are scarcely represented. The annual rainfall at Rio de Janeiro is about 60 inches, the greatest precipitation taking place in February (12 inches), and the least in August (under 1 inch). The monthly ranges of tem- perature for 1882 were January 97-68, February 95-68 ; March 95-69 ; April 87-64 ; May 84-60 ; June 82-59 ; July 85- 59; August 98-54; September 80-50; October 92-59 ; No- vember 97-59 ; December 96-62. The bay of Rio de Janeiro, the Nitherohi or "Hidden Water" of the natives, was first observed on 1st January (hence the name) by Alphonso de Souza, who supposed, as the Rio indicates, that he had discovered the mouth of a large river. How Villegagnon in 1558 took possession of the island which now bears his name but was then called after his patron Coligny, and how his colony was destroyed by the Portuguese, has been told in the article BRAZIL (vol. iv. p. 229). The city of Rio de Janeiro did not become the capital of the vioeroyalty till 1763, when Jose I. chose it in preference to Bahia because it was a better centre for defensive operations against the Spaniards. In 1711 it had been captured by- Dugnay-Trouin, who exacted 70,000 cruzados as ransom. It became the residence of the Portuguese royal family in 1808 ; in the same year its port was declared free to foreign trade ; and in the course of a short time it was made by Dom Joao VI. the seat of so many important institutions that Portugal became jealous at finding the relation between mother country and colony practically reversed. When Joao VI. returned to Portugal and Pedro was declared emperor of Brazil in 1822, Rio de Janeiro naturally remained the capital of the new state. Ecclesiastically the city was at first (from the foundation of the church of Sao Sebastiao by Mendo de Sa in 1567) subject to the diocese of Bahia (San Salvador). It was made a suffragan bishopric of Bahia by papal bull of 19th July 1576 ; and when Bahia was by the bull of 16th November 1676 created the metropolitan archbishopric of Brazil, Rio de Janeiro was (along with Pernambuco) declared a bishopric, the bishop's authority extending over the province of Espirito Santo northwards and southwards to the Rio de la Plata (Rio da Prata). The first bishop relinquished his dignity without taking possession ; and the second did not reach his diocese till 1682, when he made the church of St Sebastian on the Castle Hill his cathedral. This distinction was in 1734 transferred to the Church of the Cross and in 1738 to that of the Rosary. A new cathedral was begun in 1749 by D. Frei Antonio do Desterro, but the works were discontinued on his death, and in 1840 the materials served for the military academy. See Milliet de Saint- Adolphe, Diccionario. ... do Imp. do Brazil, Paris, 1845 ; G. Gardiner, Travels in the Interior of Brazil, 1846 ; Burmeister, Reise nach Brasilien, Berlin, 1853 ; Herbert H. Smith, Brazil, 1880 ; C. F. van Delden Laerne, Brazil and Java, 1885. (H. A. W.) KIO GEANDE (that is, " Great River " in both Spanish and Portuguese), a descriptive epithet which in a vast number of cases has become a proper name. (1) Rio GRANDE (or Rio BRAVO) DEL NORTE, which rises in the Rocky Mountains between the La Plata and San Juan ranges in the south-west of Colorado, has a total course of about 1800 miles, and forms for 1100 miles the boundary between the United States and Mexico, but owing to the shallowness of its ordinary current is navigable for steamers only to Kingsbury's Rapids, 450 miles from the sea. (2) Rio GRANDE DO NORTE, or Potengi, or Potingi,