A deciduous shrub up to 12 ft high in Japan, of bushy habit; young shoots glandular-downy. Leaves ovate, oval or obovate, pointed, tapered or sometimes rounded at the base; edged with fine, bristle-like teeth, 1 to 3 in. long, 1⁄2 to 11⁄2 in. wide, green on both surfaces, sprinkled with bristles above, bristly on the midrib and veins beneath; stalk 1⁄8 in. or less long. Racemes 11⁄2 to 21⁄2 in. long, carrying eight to twenty nodding flowers; flower-stalks glandular-downy with leaf-like bracts at the base. Corolla bell-shaped, 1⁄6 in. long, reddish; stamens downy, somewhat shorter than the corolla; calyx-lobes triangular. Blooms in June. Fruits globose, 1⁄3 in. wide, black, edible.
Native of Japan and Korea; described from a specimen collected by Richard Oldham near Nagasaki in Japan in 1863, but found earlier in Korea by Charles Wilford; introduced about 1892. Although quite hardy, it is not a particularly attractive species, but the leaves sometimes turn a good red before falling.