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Trees, small, sometimes procumbent, evergreen. Branchlets grayish, pubescent to hirsute, glabrescent. Winter buds appressed brownish pubescent to hirsute. Petiole 4--5 mm; leaf blade oblong, oblong-oblanceolate, or elliptic, occasionally obovate, 2--4(--8) X 1--2(--3) cm, leathery, glabrous or nearly so, base attenuate to obtuse, apex rounded to emarginate, lateral veins 5--7 per side and usually inconspicuous, reticulate veinlets almost invisible and sometime adaxially ± raised. Male inflorescences 1--3-flowered, densely appressed pubescent; pedicel very short to almost absent; calyx cup-shaped, 2.5--3.5 mm, densely pubescent; calyx lobes 3, erect, flat, ca. 1/2 as long as tube, apex rounded; corolla urn-shaped, 6--8.5 mm; corolla tube 4--5 mm, outside partly densely sericeous, inside glabrous; corolla lobes 3, spreading, 2--3.5 X 1.5--2 mm, apex rounded; stamens (5--)8, often partly exserted from tube; pistillode densely hirsute. Female flowers sessile or subsessile; calyx lobes 3--5, ciliate, outside tomentose; ovary 3-locular, densely hirsute, rarely glabrescent. Fruit solitary, subsessile. Fruiting calyx bowl-shaped, ca. 3 X 6 mm, pubescent or glabrous; lobes 3(--5), shorter than tube, apex rounded. Berries ellipsoid, 8--13 X ca. 8 mm, 3-locular, finely puberulous, glabrous when mature. Seeds 1--3, almost black, cylindric, often flat on one side, ca. 8 X 3.5 mm. Fr. Sep.
Leaves subcoriaceous, drying pale brown; lamina 3·5 x 1·8–8 x 3·5 cm., broadly elliptic to lanceolate–elliptic, apex usually shortly acuminate or sub–acuminate, sometimes obtuse or rounded, lower surface glabrous except for a few setulose hairs, chiefly on the midrib and margin; secondary nerves in about 5–9 pairs, together with the tertiary nerves and veins forming an indistinct reticulum.
Female flowers solitary in axils of leaves and caducous foliaceous bracts towards base of current year’s shoot, subsessile, somewhat larger than the male and with calyx and corolla less deeply divided.
Male flowers subsessile in 1–3(4)–flowered cymules in axils of leaves or towards base of current year’s growth in axils of caducous bracts; peduncle 0·1–0·3 cm. long, densely setulose.
Stamens 8–14, in pairs; filaments 0·05–0·1 cm. long, inserted on the receptacle, glabrous; anthers 0·1–0·15 cm. long, lanceolate, apiculate, glabrous or with a few apical hairs.
Corolla 0·5 cm. long, lobed to just below the middle, lobes 3, elliptic, somewhat fleshy, ascending, with densely strigulose mid–petaline lines, otherwise glabrous.
Fruit c. 1–3 x 0–9 cm., broadly ellipsoid, glabrous except for a few strigulose hairs towards the base of the persistent style.
Calyx 0·3 cm. long, densely strigulose outside, glabrous inside; lobes 3, ± deltate, very variable in shape and size.
Fruiting calyx patelliform, 0·3 cm. long, irregularly 3–lobed, lobes broadly deltate to hemi–orbicular.
Ovary 0·3 x 0 .25 cm., conoidal, densely strigulose, terminating in 3 fleshy, bilobed stigmas.
Forest shrub or small under-storey tree 5-45 ft. high with spreading and arching branches
Bark dark grey, slash black outside, red inside, sapwood white or pale straw-coloured
Evergreen shrub or small tree up to 18 m. high.
Seeds 1–2, 0 9 x 0·4 x 0·3 cm., sub–ellipsoid.
Bud–scales absent or minute and fugaceous.
Pistillode represented by a tuft of hairs.
Young shoots densely rusty pilose
Staminodes absent.
Flowers white.
