Annual (?), 3–4 ft. high (base unknown). Culms slender, erect, soft, usually simple upwards or sparingly branched, more than 3- or 4-noded, terete, quite glabrous and smooth, internodes rather long-exserted. Leaf-sheaths tight, striate, glabrous or more rarely spreadingly hirsute, with tubercle-based hairs, prominently striate, nodes glabrous, dark; ligule a narrow membranous minutely ciliolate rim or quite obscure to obsolete; blades linear from a more or less constricted rounded base, tapering to a very long fine point, 5 to over 12 in. by 2–6 lin., flat, obliquely erect, green, glabrous or softly hirsute towards the base, smooth except upwards along the finely cartilaginous margins and dorsally towards the tips, midrib obscure or slender and whitish on the face, lateral nerves very numerous and close, 4–5 primary differentiated. Panicle oblong, mostly rather contracted, jubate, sometimes open, slightly flexuous or nodding, floribund, 6–10 in. long, divided to the fourth or fifth degree, all the divisions filiform to finely filiform, angular, finely scaberulous at least upwards; primary axis slender, terete or angular, striate, smooth below; primary branches usually in false whorls, at least in the lower part or solitary in weak panicles, the longest up to over three-quarters the length of the panicle, loosely divided from 1/2–2 in. above the base; secondary branches long, their divisions loosely contracted, the penultimate divisions 4–2-spiculate forming rather loose racemes with their spikelets distant by more than their length; pedicels with minutely discoid tips, the lateral 1–2, the terminal to over 3 lin. long. Spikelets oblong, acutely acuminate, 1 1/4 lin. long, greenish, the tips often purplish. Glumes very unequal; the lower broad-ovate from a clasping base, acute in profile, a quarter to almost half the length of the spikelet, subhyaline, 1- to sub-5-nerved, the lateral nerves short to very short; the upper as long as the spikelet, membranous, finely and prominently 7–9-nerved. Lower floret ♂: valve very similar to the upper glume; valvule slightly shorter than the valve, subacute, sharply keeled, with narrow flaps all along; anthers 2/3 lin. long. Upper floret hermaphrodite, elliptic-oblong, 3/4 to almost 1 lin. by 2/5 lin., pale yellowish, polished; valve and valvule thinly crustaceous.
