ches. (Fig. 45.)

Each arch is delicately moulded and elaborately cusped, but, though in
some cases--for the shape varies in almost every window--each individual
cusp may have the look of a Gothic trefoil, the arrangement is not
Gothic at all. There are far more than are ever found in a Gothic
window, sometimes as many as eleven, and they usually begin at the
bottom with a whole instead of a half cusp. From the centre of each
abacus, cutting across the arch mouldings, another moulding runs up,
which being returned across the top encloses the upper part of each
light in a smaller square frame. It is this square frame which more than
anything else gives these windows their Eastern look, and it has been
shown how often, and indeed almost universally a square framing was put
round doorways all through the last Gothic

[Illustration: FIG. 44.

PALACE, CINTRA.

ENTRANCE COURT.]

[Illustration: FIG. 45.

PALACE, CINTRA.

WINDOW OF SALA DAS SEREIAS.]

period. In only one instance are the shafts anything but plain, and that
is in the central window overlooking the entrance court, where they are
elaborately twisted, and where also they start at the level of the floor
within instead of standing on a low parapet.

In the room itself the walls up to a certain height are covered with
tiles, diamonds of white and a beautiful olive green which are much
later than Dom Joao's time. There is also near the west end of the north
side a large fireplace projecting slightly from the wall; at either end
stands a shaft with cap and base like those of the windows, bearing a
long flat moulded lintel, while on the hearth there rest two very fine
wrought-iron Gothic fire-dogs.

East of the fireplace a door having a wide flat ogee head leads into a
small porch built in the corner of the pateo to protect the passage to
the Sala das Pegas, the first of the rooms to the south of this pateo.

In the angle formed by the end wall of the Sala dos Cysnes and the side
of the Sala das Pegas there is a small low room now called the Sala de
Dom Sebastiao or do Conselho. It is entered from the west end of the
Swan Hall through a door, which was at first a window just like all the
rest. This Hall of Dom Sebastiao or of the Council is so called from the
tradition that it was there that in 1578 that unhappy king held the
council in which it was decided to invade Morocco, an expedition which
cost the king his life and his country her independence. In re