Erect, 8-15 in. high; branches ascending, flexuous, rigid, brittle, the younger pubescent, the older covered with scars of leaf-cushions, blackish; leaves spreading or suberect, sometimes densely imbricate and, owing to the shortness of the internodes, standing in six close ranks, broad linear-trigonous, thick, glabrous, 1 1/2 lin. long; heads subglobose; bracts broad-ovate; sepals obovate, keeled, 1 1/2-2 lin. long, reaching nearly or quite to the top of the corolla; corolla narrow-ovoid or suburceolate, not (or but slightly) contracted at the throat, white, 2 lin. long; segments suberect, ovate, 2/3-7/8 of the tube in length; anthers narrow-elliptic, bifid to the middle, tapering acutely to either end, about 3/4 lin. long, decurrent-aristate; pore over 1/2 the length of the cell, nearly black; free portion of the awns very variable in length, always much shorter than the adnate portion, sometimes reduced to a mere point, and the anther then (except for the widened filament) appearing muticous.
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