Salacia
(a mythological name after Salacia, wife of Neptune). Including Anthodon, Johnia, Tonsella, and Tontelea. ORD. Celastrineae. A large genus (sixty to seventy species) of climbing or sarmentose, stove shrubs or small trees, inhabiting the tropical and sub-tropical regions of Asia, Africa, and America. Flowers usually axillary, on short branchlets, fascicled or cymose, rarely solitary or binate, sometimes paniculate; calyx small, five-parted; petals five, spreading, imbricated; stamens three, very rarely two or four. Fruit a one to three-celled berry, occasionally large, edible. Leaves generally opposite, petiolate, coriaceous, shining above, entire or crenate-serrate, exstipulate. The majority of the species are of great beauty, and are only worth growing in botanical collections. Those usually seen in gardens are described below. They thrive in sandy loam, and may be propagated by ripened cuttings, inserted in sand, under a glass, in heat. S. prinoides (Prinos-like). fl. greenish-yellow, small; peduncles axillary, one-flowered. June. fr. one-seeded, about the size and shape of a small cherry. l. serrate. East Indies, 1820. Climber. SYN. Johnia coromandeliana. S. pyriformis (Pears-shaped). fl. greenish-yellow, small; peduncles axillary, one-flowered, aggregate. June. fr. about the size of a Bergamot Pear, with a very sweet taste. l. oblong, slightly toothed. h. 5ft. Upper Guinea, 1825. Shrub.
S. Roxburghii (Roxburgh's). fl. orange-coloured, small; peduncles axillary, one-flowered. June. fr. dull red, two or three-seeded, with white pulp. l. broad-lanceolate, entire. h. 4ft. Chittagong, 1822. A small tree. SYN. Johnia salacioides.