Tree or occasionally a shrub up to 12 m high; bark grey or brown, rough, longiÂtudinally fissured or reticulate; young branchlets densely pubescent to tomentose, indumentum rusty or fulvous when young but often becoming greyish with age. Leaves densely pubescent to tomentose: petiole (0,5)1,1-3 cm long; rhachis 1,5-11 cm long (in our area); leaflets alternate or more infrequently opposite, (3)5-11 per leaf (in our area), (1,8)2-7 cm long, (0,9)1,2-3,8 cm wide (in our area), elliptic or obovate-elliptic, rarely oblong-elliptic, rounded at both ends and often slightly emarginate apically, ± densely appressed-hairy or tomentose beneath, rarely subglabrous. Stipules linear-lanceolate, up to 7 X 1 mm. Racemes 2-10-flowered, axillary, solitary or up to 3 together; axis densely rusty or fulvous-tomentose, up to 5 cm long, someÂtimes very short or absent so that the flowers appear fascicled; pedicels 1,2-5 cm long, usually tomentose like the axis. Calyx rusty or fulvous-tomentose, globose at first and 5-7 mm in diameter, ultimately rupturing irregularly into 2-5 lobes, the lobes reflexing. Petal 1, white, densely rusty-pilose outside, glabrous inside, crinkled, clawed, 2-3,6 cm long, 1,8-3 cm wide. Stamens orange-yellow, up to 1,8 cm long. Ovary glabrous. Pods deep chestnut-brown to black, ± cylindrical, (6)8-30 cm long, 1-2,3 cm in diameter, hard, indehiscent. Seeds olive-brown, 6-8 mm long, 5-7 mm wide, ± 3 mm thick, without arils or endosperm. Fig. 28. Reference: * Despite the specific epithet "madagascariensis", there is no evidence that this species occurs in MadaÂgascar or the Mascarenes beyond Desvaux's original statement which, as mentioned by Brenan I.e. : 219, is almost certainly erroneous.
