Shrubs or small trees, the branchlets terete, smooth, glabrous to ferrugineous tomentose, the nodes well spaced. Leaves lanceolate or obovate oblong, 4-18 cm long, 2.0-8.5 cm wide, usually acute, occasionally deltoid, often drawn into a triangular apical point, basally attenuate acute, rarely subobtuse, the costa prominulous to plane, sometimes grooved above, prominent beneath, to 0.15 cm wide proximally, the secondary veins 12-20, arcuate, uniting to form a submar-ginal vein ca. 1 mm from the margin, prominulous above and beneath, the inter-venal areas smooth, the veinlets evanescent, papyraceous to subcoriaceous, often gray or gray red above, often drying dull red beneath, glabrous above, glabrate or farinose puberulent beneath, especially on the veins; petioles absent or to 0.7 cm long, the lamina decurrent; stipules connate but at maturity often tearing and thus appearing free, closely appressed, thin, deciduous, each part to 2 cm long, the sheath cylindrical, subtruncate, the 2 awns long attenuate, shorter than the sheath, ciliate. Inflorescences axillary or terminal, the peduncles rarely absent, usually 3-5 per axil, spreading radially, to 2.5 cm long, often branched apically, the branches 2-3 times as long as the peduncle or shorter than the peduncle, rufous pubescent, angular, the flowers in conglomerate heads, to 1.5 cm wide. Flowers with the hypanthium short, the calycine cup much shorter than the calycine lobes, the latter narrowly oblong, to 1.5 mm long, acute or obtuse, glabrous inside and out; corolla white, the tube short, 1.2-2.0 mm long, petaloid, glabrous outside, villose within at filament attachment, the lobes 5, oblong, cu-cullate, slightly shorter than or as long as the tube; stamens 5, the anthers oblong rotund, ca. 0.5 mm long, the filaments ca. 0.8 mm long; stigmas 3, subulate, the style slender, the ovarian disc oblong, ca. 0.7 mm long. Fruits ovoid to oblong, ca. 7 mm long, usually 2 times longer than broad, drying red, the mesocarp thick, fleshy, sweet, the 2 pyrenes oblong elliptic, the ventral side flattened, the dorsal side with 10 grooves, glabrescent, the raphides numerous, the calycine cup per-sistent but withered.
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