Glabrous erect herb; rootstock slender. Vegetative shoots woody below, bearing the remains of old leaf-sheaths at the base, and an apical tassel of crowded leaves; internodes covered by leaf-sheaths; nodes not swollen. Flowering shoots similar to vegetative but with several axillary peduncles. Leaves linear, (6.5-)12.0(-18.0) cm long, 0.15-0.35 cm wide, flat on the upper surface, flat or shallowly keeled on the lower surface, acute or subacute and denticulate at the apex, ciliolate on the margin towards the base, smooth, or denticulate with narrow membranous teeth, or ciliolate on the margin towards the apex, 5-nerved with the midrib broad and well-marked especially towards the base; sheath broad and white, tending to persist after the withering of the leaf. Inflorescence: peduncles stout, erect or slightly decumbent at the base, 20-40 cm high, sometimes branched from near the base, generally branched from the upper nodes, the branches more or less spreading and bearing secondary branches; flowers 5-20 on each peduncle; internodes sometimes tinged purple, terete, glabrous; nodes not or very slightly swollen; bracts linear and leaf-like at the base of the stem, 3-10 cm long, decreasing in size upwards, the uppermost bracts and bracteoles 0.5-1.0 cm long, linear-lanceolate, acute, with a white membranous sheath about as long as the bract-width. Calyx-bracts 2(3) pairs, loosely investing the base of the calyx and attaining 0.5-0.6 of its length, subherbaceous and distinctly striate-nervose in the centre of the bract from base to acumen, with a nerveless scarious border and white membranous ciliolate margin; lower pairs narrower than upper, lanceolate-elliptic, with a long acumen; uppermost pair elliptic, 0.7-0.9 cm long, 0.2-0.3 cm wide, acuminate with an acumen 0.1-0.2 cm long. Calyx narrowly ellipsoidal, 1.3-1.5 cm long, 0.2-0.25 cm diameter, with well-marked nerves; lobes unequal, the longer lanceolate, acute, c. 0.4-0.5 cm long, with a narrow white membranous ciliolate border, the shorter lobes 0.3-0.4 cm long, narrowly ovate, subacute or obtuse and apiculate with a wide white membranous border, all lobes with 3 or 5 clear nerves, puberulous towards the apex on both surfaces; anthophore less than 0.1 cm long. Corolla pink?; petal-lamina narrowly obovate or elliptic, 0.5-0.8 cm long, 0.2-0.4 cm wide, entire or crenulate on the antical margin, gradually narrowed into the included claw at the base. Androecium : filaments c. 1.5 cm long; anthers c. 0.2 cm long. Gynoecium: gynophore less than 0.1 cm long. Capsule ovoid, not exserted beyond calyx.
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