perennial, tufted; culms erect, subgeniculate, simple, slender, over 3 ft. long, terete, glabrous, 5-noded below the panicle; sheaths tight, glabrous, the lower firm, short, persistent, keeled above, fugaciously and adpressedly hairy, the upper much shorter than the internodes; ligules membranous, rounded, up to 1 lin. long; blades narrow, linear, tapering to a long setaceous point, up to 1 ft. by 1 1/2 lin., flat or convolute above, rigid, glabrous, scabrid in the upper part; panicle consisting of about 12 erect 2–3-nate simple, long filiform branches from long narrow spathiform sheaths bearing filiform or setaceous blades; spathes finely linear, acute, 2–2 1/2 in. long, glabrous, reddish; common peduncles filiform, exserted near the tip of the spathe, the exserted part flexuous, 1/4–1 in. long, pubescent and bearded with long tubercle-based hairs, dark purple; racemes contiguous, 6–8 lin. long, one sessile, the other on a fugaciously hairy purple peduncle, joints filiform, obliquely truncate, 1 1/2 lin. long, dark purple, densely ciliate with rigid white hairs; pedicels very similar, usually produced into a fine subulate membranous appendage, facing the upper glume; sessile spikelets 2–4 in each raceme, hermaphrodite with the exception of the lowest, which is ♂ like the pedicelled; hermaphrodite spikelets linear-oblong, 2 1/2 lin. long, purple, hairy, callus acute, bearded, up to 1/2 lin. long; lower glume subchartaceous, truncate, dorsally flattened, sometimes shallowly pitted, intracarinal nerves 5, prominent above almost throughout or evanescent below, hairs scattered all over or mainly near upper margins; upper glume obtuse, 3-nerved, hairy above; lower valve almost equalling the glumes, linear, obtuse, sub-2-nerved, scantily ciliate; upper shortly 2-lobed, ciliate, 3-nerved near the base, awn about 1 in. long, slender, pubescent and kneed below the middle; pale 0; ♂ spikelets narrowly lanceolate, up to 3–3 1/2 lin. long, muticous, hairy or lowest glabrous, 7–9-nerved, keels scantily and rigidly ciliate above; upper acute, hairy or glabrous, long ciliate; valves almost equalling the glumes, ciliate, lower 3-, upper 1-nerved. null
