COURT OF THE MYRTLES, ALHAMBRA
The pool is bordered on both sides by beautiful old hedges.
As is the case with almost every Mohammedan building, its exterior is extremely plain. But once the door is passed one seems to have stepped from Europe to the Orient. Courtyards and porticos, halls and passages, open before the visitor in a truly oriental maze of color and decoration. The first important court is known as that of the Myrtles. In its center is a marble basin a hundred and thirty feet long, bordered with trees of myrtle and orange, and flanked at both ends by two-storied pavilions with slender marble shafts and graceful Moorish arches. From one of these pavilions opens the Hall of the Ambassadors, the throne room of the califs, and the largest chamber in the palace.
THE ALHAMBRA'S BEAUTY
But it is not its size that makes this room imposing. Here, as elsewhere in the palace, it is the decoration. Rising for three or four feet from the floor is a band of colored Moorish tiles. All the wall above is of stucco, molded in lacelike patterns and painted in blues and reds and brilliant golden yellows. The designs are largely geometrical or floral, frequently interspersed with Arabic inscriptions. Some of these when translated read, "God is our refuge," "Praise be to God," familiar phrases in Mohammedan faith, or "There is no conqueror but God." Add to this decoration of the walls imposing stalactite domes, and ceilings often of cedarwood inlaid with mother of pearl, and imagine the floors and windows again adorned with oriental rugs and hangings, and the beauty of the Alhambra will be easily understood.
HALL OF REPOSE OF THE BATHS, ALHAMBRA
THE GATE OF JUSTICE