Mallet to 10 m tall. Non-lignotuberous. Bark smooth, of 'oily' appearance, dark grey to light brownish grey over yellowish green or bronze. Pith glands present in branchlets; three-year old branchlets may become glaucous. Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): not seen. Adult leaves held more or less erect, alternate, petiole 1–2 cm long; blade narrowly lanceolate, (4.3)5–12.5 cm long, 0.7–1.7 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, margins entire, apex pointed, concolorous, glossy, dark green, side-veins acute or obscure, reticulation obscured by numerous round oil glands, intramarginal vein close to edge or obscure. Inflorescence axillary, single, peduncles rounded to only narrowly flattened, scarcely broadened apically, erect or rigidly down-turned, 0.7–1.3 cm long, buds 7, conspicuously pedicellate (pedicels 0.3–0.7 cm long). Mature buds 2.9–4 cm long, 0.6–0.9 cm wide, scar present (outer operculum shed early), operculum very elongated, finely tapering and often curved, to 7 times the length of the globular hypanthium and narrower than it at the join, stamens erect, anthers narrowly oblong, versatile, sub-basifixed with the filament tapering abruptly, dehiscing by longitudinal slits, style straight, just shorter than the longest stamens, stigma tapering to blunt, locules (3)4, the placentae convex, each with 4 to 6 vertical ovule rows or the rows indistinct. Flowers yellow-green. Fruit erect or down-turned, pedicellate (pedicels 0.1–0.6 cm long), hemispherical or truncate-globose, 0.6–0.8 cm long, 0.8–1.3 cm wide, disc narrow, descending obliquely to vertically, valves (3)4, strongly exserted. Seeds brown to straw-coloured, 1.8–3 mm long, cuboid to ovoid, dorsal surface narrowly and irregularly fissured, sides angled, margin irregular, hilum terminal or ventral. (Seedcoat often referred to as being honey-combed.) Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons Y-shaped (bisected); stems square in cross-section, smooth; leaves always petiolate, opposite for 5 to 7 nodes then alternate, ovate, 2.5–4 cm long, 1–3.3 cm wide, base truncate to tapering, green to grey-green, dull.
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