DESCRIPTION.
Stem shrubby, growing a foot high, upright, with numerous, crowded, undivided, and ascending branches.
Leaves growing mostly by sixes, sharp-pointed, spreading, and smooth, channelled underneath, and pressed to the stem by short foot-stalks.
Flowers numerous, growing nearly at the end of branches, in hard close-set spikes; the lower part of a light yellow, the extremity of a light green.
Empalement. Cup permanent, double; the outer many-leaved, unequal, and spear-shaped; the inner four-leaved, which are yellow, crooked, and spatula-shaped; their upper part hard, inflated, sharp-pointed, and tending to each other.
Blossom somewhat cylindrical, with a tapered base; the mouth blunt, and divided into a four-cleft, equal border, whose segments tend to each other.
Chives. Eight hair-like threads, nearly of a length with the blossom, fixed into the receptacle. Tips bearded, and within the blossom.
Pointal. Seed-vessel roundish. Shaft thread-shaped, and longer than the threads. Summit four-cornered.
Native of the Cape of Good Hope.
In bloom from November till April.