Cambessedesia
(named after James Cambessedes, coadjutor of Auguste St. Hilaire, in his "Flora Brasiliae Meridionalis," and author of several botanical memoirs). ORD. Melastomaceae. A genus of elegant, erect, or ascending, dichotomously branched stove shrubs or herbaceous plants. Flowers terminal and axillary, in paniculate cymes; petals five, obovate; calyx bell-shaped. Leaves sessile, opposite or verticillate, obovate, oblong or linear. They thrive best in a compost of peat and sand. Propagated by half-ripened cuttings, which root freely in a similar mixture, if placed in heat and under a hand glass. There are about eight species known to science, but probably that mentioned below is the only one in cultivation.
C. paraguayensis (Paraguay). fl. rose-red, 2/3in. in diameter, in terminal corymbose, glandular, hairy panicles. July. l. nearly 1in. long, sessile, ovate, acute, three-nerved, pale green, with entire ciliate margins. Stem annual, herbaceous, leafy. h. 10in. to 18in. 1880. (B. M. 6604.)