Trees, sometimes shrubs, 2-20 m tall, the trunk to 60 cm in diam, the bark reddish-brown. Leaves grouped towards the apex of the branchlets, the petiole to 1.5 cm long, canaliculate above; blade obovate, oblong-obovate, or narrowly obo,-vate, long-attenuate at the base, obtusely acuminate to sometimes obtuse at the apex, to 12 cm long and 5--cm wide, rigid-chartaceous to coriaceous, the margins plane to subrevolute and mostly entire, the midvein ? impressed above and prominent below, the lateral veins inconspicuous on both surfaces. Flowers axillary, solitary, the pedicels terete, 2-5 cm long, the bracteoles inserted just below the calyx, op- posite, unequal, ovate to subcircular, to 4 mm long, the margins entire to gland-ular-denticulate; sepals unequal, subcircular to broadly ovate, rounded or acute to apiculate at the apex, to 10 mm long, white or greenish-white, the margin scarious, the outer ones entire-margined or sometimes conspicuously glandular-denticulate; petals white, yellow at the apex, ovate, as long as or slightly shorter than the calyx, connate at the base of the petals, to 1.5 mm long, the anthers narrowly oblong, to 2 mm long, the connective projected into an appendage 1-1.75 mm long; ovary conical, 2-celled, each cell 4-5-ovulate, the style to 7 mm long, the stigma puncti-form. Bacca broadly ovoid, commonly surmounted by a slender stylar beak, to 1.8 cm long and wide, brownish, bursting irregularly at maturity; seeds few, scarlet, to 10 mm long.
Moist to wet forests at low to medium elevations in Panama. Moist or wet thickets or mixed forest or pine forest, sometimes on limestone, at elevations up to 3,150 metres in Guatemala.
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