Ternstracemia
(named after Christopher Ternstroem, a Swedish naturalist and traveller in China, who died in 1745). SYN. Taonabo. Including Reinwardtia (of Korthals). ORD. Ternstraemiaceae. A genus comprising about twenty-five species of stove, evergreen trees or shrubs, of which five or six are found in the warmer parts of Asia and the Indian Archipelago, and the rest in tropical America. Sepals five, closely imbricated; petals five, imbricated, connate at base; stamens indefinite, adnate to the base of the corolla; peduncles one-flowered, recurved, axillary or lateral, solitary or sub-fasciculate, bibracteolate. Leaves coriaceous, entire or crenate-serrate. A selection of the few introduced species is given below. All are shrubs. They thrive in well-drained, fibrous loam, and are readily propagated by cuttings of the half-ripened young shoots, inserted under a bell glass, in bottom heat. T. elliptica (elliptic-leaved). fl. white; sepals rounded; peduncles drooping. July. l. variable, spathulate or elliptic, 3in. long, rather blunt, quite entire, obsoletely veined. h. 6ft. West Indies, 1818. SYN. T. peduncularis. T. peduncularis (pedunculate-flowered). A synonym of T. elliptica. T. sylvatica (sylvan). fl. white; petals not lined; anthers apiculate; bracts ovate, acute, under the calyx. July. l. lanceolate, obtusely acuminate. Branches smooth. h. 2ft. Mexico, 1840.
T. venosa (veined). fl. white; pedicels aggregate, axillary, a little shorter than the petioles. June to August. l. oblong, serrulated, veined. h. 6ft. Brazil, 1824.