The part here reproduced is the far-famed Court of Lions, the Tribunal of Justice, and the Hall of the Abencerrages and the Divan. The outside of these courts is covered with diaper work, consisting of inscriptions in Arabic character, of conventional representation of flowers and of flowing decoration, over which the eye wanders, delighted with the harmony of the colouring and the variety of the ornament. Entering through the central archway, we see before us the fountain, supported by the lions that give name to the court; and, through the archway opposite, the splendid fringe of the stalactite roof of the Hall of the Abencerrages, composed in the original of five thousand separate pieces, which key into and support each other. The Court of Lions here is 75 feet long, just two-thirds the length of the original; the columns are the same height and size as the columns of which they are restorations, and the arches that spring from them are also of the actual size of the original arches. Over the columns is inscribed in Cufic characters, “_And there is no Conqueror but God._” Round the basin of the fountain is an Arabic poem, from which we take two specimens:-- “Oh thou who beholdest these Lions crouching--fear not! Life is wanting to enable them to show their fury!” Less, we must think, a needless caution to the intruder, than the poet’s allowed flattery to his brother artist. In the verse of Greece and modern Italy, we find the same heightened expression of admiration for the almost animating art of sculpture. The following passage is oriental in every letter:-- “Seest thou not how the water flows on the surface, notwithstanding the current strives to oppose its progress. Like a lover whose eyelids are pregnant with tears, and who suppresses them for fear of a tale-bearer.”