an annual herb, parasitical, 1/2–3 ft. high; stem erect or ascending, simple or rarely branched, fleshy, nearly terete when alive, furrowed-angular, strongly furrowed and angular when dried, whitish or yellowish, densely clothed with foliaceous scales at least on the lower part, scaly-tuberculate below, descending deep into the ground, glabrous or more or less viscid-puberulous especially above; branches when present short, virgate towards the apex; leaves scale-like, scattered or opposite, usually crowded, numerous, ovate or lanceolate, obtuse or apiculate, not much narrowed at the base, sessile, entire, adpressed, concave, decurrent, dusky-yellow, glabrous or somewhat viscid-puberulous, 1/4–1 1/4 in. long, 1/16– 1/2 in. broad, the lower smaller; bracts ovate or lanceolate, concave, 1/2–1 in. long, orange-yellow, puberulous or pubescent; bracteoles opposite, lanceolate or sublinear, obtuse, concave, orange-yellow, puberulous or pubescent, 3/8– 5/8 in. long; flowers numerous, sessile or shortly pedicellate, 1 1/2–1 3/5 in. long; spikes dense, many-flowered, elongated, 3–12 in. long or more; pedicels usually much less than 1/4 in. long; calyx campanulate-oblong, loose, erect, angular, puberulous or pubescent outside, bright orange and yellow, 1/2– 3/4 in. long, unequally 5-cleft, unibracteate and bibracteolate at the base; lobes lanceolate or ovate, obtuse or scarcely acute, 1/6– 3/8 in. long; corolla tough, not membranous, brilliant flaring yellow; tube subcylindrical, clavate, somewhat arching, yellow, viscid-puberulous outside, 1 1/8–1 1/2 in. long, gradually and slightly widening upwards, 1/5– 1/3 in. in diam. near the top; limb somewhat ringent, 1/2– 5/8 in. in diam., deep orange or purplish or sometimes dusky-orange; lobes rounded, subequal, 1/6– 1/4 in. long, glabrous within; stamens all perfect; filaments white, flattened, somewhat glandular-pilose; anthers yellowish or somewhat orange, glabrous; style exceeding the stamens, bent downwards near the top, not protruded in the living state; stigma clavate, yellow; capsule conical, bisulcate, glabrous, 7/8 in. long; seeds numerous, subcylindrical, truncate at both ends, 1/25 in. long, reticulate; testa loose, membranous. null
