Annual slender erect herb 10–30 cm. tall, not or sparsely branched; stems sharply 4-ribbed, glabrous or sparsely pubescent.. Leaf-blades elliptic to ovate or ovate-lanceolate, 0.4–2.8 cm. long, 0.15–1.3 cm. wide, acute at the apex, cuneate at the base, thin, discolorous, glabrous save for the ciliate margins and base of the midnerve beneath or pubescent above and on midnerve beneath; petiole obsolete or ± 1 mm. long, ciliate; stipule-sheath small, up to about 0.8 mm. long, pubescent, the margins only obscurely fimbriate.. Flowers isostylous, in terminal and axillary cymes; central flower of the cyme ± sessile, the laterals on pedicels 0.4–1.1 cm. long.. Calyx-tube ovoid, 0.5 mm. long, glabrous or pubescent; lobes linear-lanceolate, 1–1.6 mm. long, ciliate.. Corolla white; tube slender, widened at the throat, 3–3.5 mm. long, glabrous inside and out; lobes ovate, 1.2 mm. long, 0.8 mm. wide.. Style ± 3 mm. long; stigma-lobes 0.8 mm. long.. Capsule ovoid-globose, 2 mm. long, 2.3 mm. wide, mostly distinctly shortly spreading pubescent, crowned by the persistent calyx-lobes and produced into a distinct compressed beak ± 1 mm. long, so that whole fruit appears broad near the base and narrowed to the apex.. Seeds ellipsoid, angular, longest dimension 0.65 mm., shortest dimension 0.35 mm.. Fig. 40/12, p. 270, and 42, p. 288.
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