A loosely tufted perennial. Culms erect or geniculately ascending, 1–3 ft. high, slender, terete, wiry, simple, 2–3-noded, glabrous and smooth. Leaves mostly basal; sheaths tight, firm, shorter than the internodes, sparsely pilose from minute tubercles, especially near the margins, or glabrescent, rarely bearded at the nodes; ligule a densely ciliolate rim; blade linear, finely acute, 2–8 in. long, 1 1/2–2 3/4 lin. wide, flat, rather rigid, green, sparsely hairy from tubercles mainly on or near the scaberulous margins, or glabrescent. Panicle narrow, erect or nodding, 2–9 in. long, 1/4–1 1/2 in. wide, more or less contracted; rhachis slender, glabrous, smooth in the lower part, scaberulous above; branches ascending, angular, flexuous, filiform, scaberulous, bearing 4–1 unequally pedicelled spikelets towards their tips, the lower clustered, up to 4 in. long, the upper gradually shorter; pedicels scaberulous or scabridly ciliolate, 1 1/2–6 (or more) lin. long. Spikelets narrowly lanceolate, acuminate, 5–7 lin. long, shining, dark brown. Glumes glabrous, smooth, firmly chartaceous, 3-nerved; lower oblong or ovate-oblong, rotundate-truncate at the apex, 2–2 1/2 lin. long; upper linear-lanceolate, obtuse or truncate, 5 1/2–7 lin. long. Lower floret ♂: valve narrowly lanceolate, acuminate, subacute at the apex, 5 1/2–6 1/2 lin. long, firmly chartaceous, 3-nerved; valvule linear, obtuse or truncate, 3–4 lin. long, membranous, keels very narrowly winged, ciliolate above the middle. Upper floret linear-oblong: callus 1/4– 1/3 lin. long, densely bearded with white hairs, emarginate and two-toothed; valve 2 3/4–3 1/4 lin. long, 2-lobed, with the lobes acute and 1/4– 1/2 lin. long, finely 7-nerved, appressedly pubescent except towards the apex, thinly coriaceous; awn slender, 3/4–2 in. long; column pale brown, about 1/2 in. long; valvule linear, 3 lin. long. Anthers 2, 1 1/2 lin. long.
