A small, smooth shrub with erect or nearly erect, wandlike branches, I to 4 feet high. Leaves oval to oblong, smooth above, slightly hairy on the veins and also black-dotted beneath, pointed at the apex and base, the margins entire, 11/2 to 3 inches long, rather thin, somewhat persistent over winter, but scarcely evergreen. Flowers white or pink, showy, about one-half of an inch long, cylindric, nodding, few or several in lateral umbels or clusters on the almost leafless branches of the preceding season; segments of the calyx large and long pointed, almost leaflike. Fruit an ovoid-pyramidal capsule, one-eighth or one-sixth of an inch long.

In sandy fields, thickets and clearings, near the coast from Rhode Island to Florida and west to Tennessee and Arkansas. Flowering in May and June.

Memoir 15 N. Y. State Museum

Plate 155

B. Staggerbush - Neopieris mariana