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Perennial mat grass, with long stout deeply penetrating rhizomes bearing dense tufts of spiny glaucous shoots at the nodes; culms 15–32 cm. high, ascending, branched only at the base. Leaf-blades linear-lanceolate, 1–6 cm. long, 1–5 mm. wide, pilose on both sides, often only sparingly, margins scabrid especially towards the tip. Inflorescence narrowly elliptic to elliptic-oblong, rarely almost linear, 1.5–7 cm. long, brownish or purplish; racemes erect, 1–3 cm. long, with 3–14 spikelets. Spikelets 4–9-flowered, elliptic to narrowly elliptic-oblong, 5–9 mm. long; glumes unequal, scaberulous on the nerve, rounded or slightly keeled, lower glume broadly lanceolate, 1.8–2.4 mm. long, acute, upper glume elliptic-oblong to oblong, 2.7–3.3 mm. long, ± obtuse, sometimes mucronulate; lemmas narrowly ovate, 2.3–3.3 mm. long, membranous with scarious margins, hairs on the lateral nerves 0.75–1 mm. long, the central ones shorter. Grain elliptic-oblong, 1.1–1.2 mm. long, chestnut brown, slightly concave on the hilar side; pericarp free. Fig. 79, p. 287.