Small shrub with puberulous young twigs.. Leaf-blades ovate, sometimes elliptic, 6–11 cm. long, 2.5–4.5 cm. wide, acuminate at apex, rounded at base, glabrous above but with puberulous midnerve, very sparsely hairy beneath but more densely so on the nerves, papery; 5–8 pairs of main lateral nerves; domatia absent; petiole 3–5 mm. long, puberulous; stipules triangular, fused at the base, 1–2 mm. long, with awns up to 10 mm. long, puberulous outside.. Flowers 5-merous, possibly heterostylous, subsessile, mostly solitary; bracts and bracteoles 3–4 pairs, cupular, puberulous, the upper cups provided with evident needle-like appendages often exceeding the calyx.. Calyx-tube glabrous; limb-tube ellipsoid, showing one deep split when the flower-bud enlarges, appearing spathaceous, 5 mm. long, pubescent inside and outside; lobes 3–5 mm. long, needle-like, puberulous.. Corolla white, glabrous; tube 9 mm. long, 2 mm. in diameter, sparsely hairy within; lobes 9 mm. long, 4 mm. wide.. Anthers sessile, 4 mm. long, shortly apiculate, half-included.. Placenta with 2–3 ovules; style glabrous, included; stigmatic lobes lying between the anther-bases.. Fruit of unknown colour, spheroidal, somewhat didymous, ± 1 cm. in diameter, subtended by the persistent cups of bracteoles.. Seeds mostly 1 in each chamber, hemi-ellipsoid; seed-coat with small elevated cells.. Fig. 92.
Home