Small, slender climber, 2-5 m. Leaves 3-6(-7)-jugate, with 4-jugate leaves always present; leaflets mostly glossy on both sides, dark green above, pale beneath, mostly coriaceous, brittle in the herbarium, ovate, obovate to elliptic, rarely lanceolate, base usually cuneate, apex acute, rarely blunt, margin in exposed places recurved, usually with 1-5 pairs of bluntish teeth, ¾-2½ by ½-1½ cm, usually sessile but lateral pedicels up to 2 mm, nerves above usually impressed, beneath usually prominent, often nigrescent in sicco. Racemes axillary or terminal, rachis ½-21l2cm; flowers 1-3 pairs, pedicels ¾-l¼ cm, both often lax-puberulous. Calyx green suffused with red, coriaceous to herbaceous, 1½-3 cm, tube as long as or up to 2 times as long as the acute triangular lobes. Corolla pink to carmine, inside creamy, sometimes streaked red inside, 6-8(-10) cm including the triangular, acute lobes 1½-2½ by 1½-3 cm. Staminode usually less than 1 cm. Capsule 11-14 by 3-4cm, compressed; valves coriaceous. Seeds c. l½ cm Ø.
Mossy thickets and heaths, often burned, ridges in high forest, open scrub and secondary forest, sometimes on peaty soil or on limestone, 1250-3100 m. Fl. Sept.-Febr. (once April); fr. Aug., Nov., Jan., April.
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