A small and beautiful indigenous tree, growing from 10 to 20 feet high. The young shoots and expanding leaves are clothed with a rusty down, soon glabrous. The leaves are thin, smooth, entire, ovate-oblong, acuminate, 8 to 12 inches long, by 3 or 4 broad, tapering to very short petioles. The flowers are dull-purple, axillary, and solitary; the petals veiny, round-ovate, the outer ones orbicular, and three or four times as large as the calyx. The flowers appear early with the leaves (which are then small), and are about 1 1/2 inch wide. The fruit is a yellowish, ovoid oblong, pulpy pod, 2 or 3 inches long by about 1 inch in diameter, fragrant, sweet, edible in autumn, and contains about 8 seeds.

Laxative (fruit); diuretic (leaves)

Plants for a Future
King's American Dispensatory

To boils, ulcers and abscesses (leaves)