Shrub or small tree to 4 m tall; twigs loosely pubescent with ochraceous, short-stalked porrect and multangulate stellae, armed with stout recurved spines to 5 mm long, glabrescent. Leaves to 15 cm long, ovate or elliptic, apically acute or acuminate, basally obtuse or rounded, mostly dimidiate, margins entire or usually repand, above with dispersed, nearly sessile porrect stellae which lack midpoints, beneath lightly tomentose with stalked, long-armed stellae, the mid-points wanting; petioles loosely tomentose, mostly unarmed; minor leaves often present. Inflorescence lateral, an unbranched raceme, the peduncles slender and remaining so, to 3 cm long; pedicels slender, 8-15 mm long, tomentulose, becoming thicker apically but not much longer in fruit. Flowers sometimes showy, slender and elongate; calyx 2-3 mm long with short, acicular lobes, not usually splitting at the sinuses in flower, finely-tomentose outside; corolla purple, lobed nearly to the base, the lobes 1.5-2 mm long, lanceolate, the median portion pubescent outside; stamens equal, the anthers narrowly lanceolate, coming to a fine apical point, 10 mm long, at first connivant but soon free, opening by minute terminal pores; style with stellate hairs along its length. Fruit a bright red or orange, juicy, globose berry 6-9 mm across.
Home