Herbs or subshrubs, perennial, erect, to 1 m or taller; stems rounded, flattened, or 4-angled, glabrous. Leaves subsessile to petiolate; petiole to 5 mm, glabrous; blade drying papery or leathery, ovate, ovate-lanceolate, or lanceolate-elliptic, 4-13 × 1.5-6.5 cm, glabrous, base cuneate to rounded, apex acute; secondary veins indistinct; stipules united around stem, broadly triangular or truncate, 1-3 mm, glabrous, entire, sometimes partially costate, acute to mucronate. Inflorescences terminal, compound-cymose to paniculate, 5-15 × 4-10 cm, glabrous, several to many flowered, pedunculate; peduncles 2-7 cm; axes regularly dichotomous, spreading at 90° or more; bracts triangular to linear, 0.5-5 mm; pedicels 2-5 mm. Flowers pedicellate. Calyx glabrous; hypanthium portion ovoid, 0.7-1 mm; limb 0.5-0.8 mm, lobed for 1/2-2/3, lobes triangular. Corolla white, funnelform to tubular, outside glabrous; tube ca. 1.5 mm, apparently barbate in throat; lobes narrowly triangular, ca. 1.5 mm. Anthers and stigmas not seen. Fruit capsular, subglobose, 1.5-2.5 mm, glabrous, stiffly papery to cartilaginous, septicidally then loculicidally dehiscent; seeds several, angled. Fl. Jul-Sep, fr. Aug-Mar.
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