Eriosema
(from erion, wool, and sema, a standard; vexillum clothed with silky hairs). ORD. Leguminosae. A genus of about forty species of stove herbaceous plants and shrubs, most abundant in South America and tropical and South Africa. One species has a wide range in Asia and Australia. Flowers yellow or violet; racemes or fascicles axillary. Leaves digitately trifoliolate. The two best species are described below. They thrive in a compost of peat and loam. Propagated by seeds or cuttings.
E. grandiflorum (large-flowered). fl., racemes terminal and axillary, panicled; corollas covered with soft pubescence on both surfaces. October. l., leaflets oblong-elliptic, mucronate; petioles very short, and, as well as the nerves and veins on the under surface of the leaves, clothed with silky rufous down. Branches angular. h. 1ft. to 2ft. North Mexico. E. violaceum (violaceous). fl. violaceous; racemes axillary and terminal, many-flowered. July and August. l., leaflets three, oblong-linear, acute, greenish above and velvety, but clothed with rusty hairs beneath. h. 4ft. Tropical South America and Trinidad, 1820.