Slender shrub, up to 7 m. Bark dull grey and smooth. Young branchlets whitish pubescent, glabrescent. Leaves chartaceous, shining on both surfaces, young leaves pubescent beneath especially on the nerves and veins, glabrescent, elliptic-oblong to broadly lanceolate, 4-9 by 1.5-3.25 cm; base cuneate to attenuate; margins slightly thickened and shining on both surfaces; apex acuminate, the acumen up to 1 cm, pointed or obtuse at the tip; nerves and veins undistin-guishable, numerous, divaricate, subparallel, some of them branched, distinct beneath, obsolete above; petiole 3-4 mm. Inflorescences axillary, sessile or very short peduncled, usually with a few, very small, caducous bracts, 2-or 3-flowered; pedicels c. 3.5 mm, sparsely pubescent. Flowers short-tubular, 5-6 mm long, yellowish. Floral tube 3½-4 mm long, sparsely pubescent outside, pubescent towards the base and at the mouth inside. Calyx lobes 5(-6), ovate and obtuse, sparsely pubescent outside, densely puberulous inside, 1½-2 mm long. Petaloid appendages obscure, rim-like. Stamens free from the tube slightly below the petaloid appendages, 2/3-1.5 mm, episepalous ones with a filament shorter than the anther or as long as it, the others sessile. Pistil c. 2 mm long. Ovary ellipsoid, densely puberulous, narrowed into a short style c. 1 mm; stigma nipple-like. Fruits globose or slightly obovate, glabrous when mature, c. 8 mm diam., with a slender stipe 3-6 mm; persistent floral tube splitting on one side. Seed ovoid, plano-convex, black, c. 1 cm long, with a short caruncle-like appendage.
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