perennial, compactly tufted; culms erect, rather slender, 3–4 ft. long, glabrous, shining, about 5-noded below the panicle; sheaths of innovation shoots compressed, fugaciously tomentose at the base, sheaths of the culms terete, quite glabrous or the uppermost scantily hairy, smooth; ligules obtuse, up to 2 1/2 lin. long, hairy behind; blades linear from a narrow base, tapering to a fine point, up to 1 ft. by 2–3 lin. long, erect, rather rigid, flat, glabrous, or the uppermost scantily hairy, subglaucous, turning reddish, scabrid, margins spinulous; panicle narrow, 1–1 1/2 ft. long, remotely branched, contracted, spathes narrow, lanceolate, acute, about 1 1/2 in. long, scarious, reddish; common peduncles finely filiform, long exserted, glabrous except the strongly curved or curled tips, which are densely beset with long spreading, yellowish, tubercle-based hairs; racemes 1/2–1 in. long, lax, scarcely spreading; joints 5–10, filiform, obliquely truncate, up to 1 1/2 lin. long, shortly ciliate; pedicels very similar; spikelets of the lowest pair of the sessile raceme alike, ♂, the sessile of all the other pairs hermaphrodite, the pedicelled ♂ or sometimes with stamens and an apparently perfect pistil; sessile hermaphrodite spikelets linear-oblong, 2 lin. long, purplish, pale below; lower glume subchartaceous above, membranous near the base, minutely truncate, dorsally flattened, glabrous or minutely and scantily pubescent or villous, intracarinal nerves about 5, evanescent below the tip, keels rigidly ciliate above, callus shortly bearded; upper glume membranous, 3-nerved, nerves scabrid above; lower valve oblong, obtuse, faintly 2-nerved, ciliate; upper shortly bifid, 1-nerved, lobes oblong, obtuse, ciliate, awn about 6–8 lin. long, very slender, pubescent and kneed below the middle; pale ovate, obtuse, 1/2 lin. long; anthers 3/4 lin. long; pedicellate spikelets oblong-linear, 2 1/2 lin. long, dull purplish, glabrous or hairy; lower glume subherbaceous, acute, 9–11-nerved; upper very acute, 3-nerved, long ciliate; lower valve linear-oblong, obtuse, equalling the glumes, 3-nerved; upper 1/4– 1/3 shorter, spathulate-linear from an extremely fine base, sub-1-nerved; anthers more than 1 lin. long. null
