Erect, pleasantly aromatic, multi-stemmed herb or subshrub to 700 mm high and to 1 m in diameter. Roots slightly fleshy. Branches 2-6 mm in diameter, terete, mostly erect, rooting when decumbent and occasionally bearing stilted roots; light to dark brown, densely villous; young branches maroon-purple, glandular villous; hairs translucent, multicellular, 1.5-2 mm long, and with translucent, shortly stalked-spot glands; internodes 10-25 mm apart. Leaves ascending-spreading softly succulent, in opposite pairs; petiole 8-16 mm long, villous and with colourless, shortly stalked-spot glands; blade irregularly 5-lobed (2 lateral pairs and a central lobe), dorsiventrally flattened, triangular to broadly ovate in outline, 12-27 x 12-30 mm; base truncate; apex obtuse to acute; lower pair of lobes oblong to 12 x 6 mm, bearing subacute apices, upper pair broadly triangular, terminal lobe triangular-ovate, lobes curving down when under water stress; adaxial surface slightly rugose, glandular hairy; abaxial surface densely rugose, densely hairy and beset with translucent, shortly stalked dot glands. Inflorescence a simple erect raceme 180-280 mm long, occasionally with a pair of side branches at the base. Flowers in 6-8-flowered cymes forming 12-16-flow-ered verticillasters 3-12 mm apart; bracts ovate, 2 x 1.3 mm (early deciduous); pedicels 2-5 mm long ascending, spreading. Calyx basally gibbose, tinged purple at swelling, at flowering 3 mm long, enlarging to 6 mm, consisting of a larger, broadly ovate horizontal upper lip 2 x 2 mm (3 x 2.5 mm long after flowering, and becoming erect) and 4 smaller and narrower lobes 1.5 mm in length (2-2.5 mm long after flowering), glandular pubescent. Corolla 8-10 mm long, violet-purple, bilabiate; tube slightly bent, white at base, 4.5 mm long, 1.5 mm in diameter, expanding to 2 mm at throat, 4-lobed, upper lobes 1.5 mm long lateral 0.7 mm long, lower lip 4 mm long, boat-shaped, white at centre. Stamens 4 (1 pair slightly longer), fused at base, declinate in lower lip; free for about 2 mm; pollen orange. Stigma bifid, slightly longer than long stamens. Nutlets black, flattened, circular, 1.5 mm in diameter.
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