1 ft. or more high, entirely glabrous; branches virgate below, sometimes spreading near the apex, the younger deeply channelled by the decurrent leaf-cushions; leaves 3-nate or sometimes scattered, erect to spreading, linear, acuminate, incurved, concave above, sulcate below, somewhat glaucous, 4–6 lin. long; inflorescence axillary; flowers corolline, verticillate in close ovoid or oblong heads or false spikes, 1/2–2 in. long, 7/8 in. in diam., spreading in every direction; pedicels slender, 1 1/2 lin. long; bracts remote, small, pallid; sepals broad-lanceolate, acuminate, concave, keeled towards the apex, cartilaginous, pallid, only slightly imbricate at the base, about 2 lin. long; corolla-tube ovoid, 3–4 lin. long, throat contracted, rosy; segments stellate-spreading or reflexed, narrow-ovate, acute, somewhat paler than the tube, 1 1/2 by 1 lin.; anthers exactly elliptical, broadly rounded at either extremity, about 1/3 lin. long, muticous; pore 1/3 the length of the cell; stigma capitate, just manifest in the throat; seeds with a wide suborbicular membranous margin. null
