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High above the dark tile roofs there tower the two strange kitchen chimneys, huge conical spires ending in round funnels, now all plastered, but once covered with a pattern of green and white tiles. Entrance Court. 2. Sala dos Cysnes. 3. Central Pateo. 4. Sala das Pegas. 5. " " Sereias. 5ª. " do Conselho. 6. Sala da Jantar. 7. Servery. 8. Sala dos Arabes. 9. Chapel. 10. Kitchen. 11.
In the north-west corner and reached by the same spiral stair, but at a higher level than the Sala das Sereias, is the Sala dos Arabes, so called because it is commonly believed to be a part of the original building.
Without tiles, rooms like the Sala das Sereias or the Sala dos Arabes would be plain whitewashed featureless apartments, with them they have a charm and a romance not easy to find anywhere but in the East.
These dining-room tiles, and also those in the neighbouring Sala das Sereias, are among the most beautiful in the palace. The ground is as usual white, and on each is embossed a beautiful green vine-leaf with branches and tendril.
From the Sala das Pegas one door leads up a few steps into the Sala das Sereias, and another to the dining-room. This Sala das Sereias, so called from the mermaids painted on the ceiling, is a small room some eighteen feet square. It is lit by a two-light window opening towards the courtyard, a window just like those of the Sala das Pegas and of the Sala dos Cysnes.
Altogether it looks as if it were later than Dom João's time, for it is the only window where the capitals are not of the usual Arab form, and they are not at all like some in the castle of Sempre Noiva built about the beginning of the sixteenth century. The wall-tiles of the dining-room are like those of the Sala das Sereias, but end in a splendid cresting.
The ceiling is modern and uninteresting. Next to the north comes the servery, a room without interest but for its window which looks west, and is like the two older dining-room windows. Returning to the Sala das Sereias, a spiral stair leads down to the central pateo, which can also be reached from the porch in the south-west corner.
Two other doors, with simple pointed heads, lead one into the dining-room, and one into the Sala das Sereias.
These are found round a door leading out of a small room, called from the mermaids on the ceiling the Sala das Sereias. The pointed door is enclosed in a square frame by a band of narrow dark and light tiles with white squares between, arranged in checks, while in the spandrels is a very beautiful arabesque pattern in black on a white ground.
Returning to the Sala das Sereias and passing through the servery and another room an open court is reached called the Pateo de Diana, from a fountain over which Diana presides, and on to which one of the dining-room windows looks.
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