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Shrub or woody climber; stems hispid-tomentose when young, becoming glabrescent and scabrid with age; bark grey or black, dotted with lenticels; Leaves subsessile, elliptic to broadly elliptic or ovate-elliptic, 8-16 cm long and 4-5-10 cm broad, obtuse at the base, apex rounded to abruptly acute or apiculate, densely hispid-tomentose when young, glabrescent and scabrid above when mature, drying dark brownish above, paler below; secondary nerves 7-10 on each side, oblique, distinct below; petiole 0-5 mm long, channelled above; axillary glands present. Inflorescence cymose, compact, 1—several-flowered, terminal on short branches, appearing together with or before the leaves, hispid; peduncles short; bracts narrowly lanceolate, 6 mm long; pedicels slender, 7-10 mm long. Flowers cream to yellowish with red or purple markings, scented. Calyx hispid-tomentose, 10-14 mm long; sepals linear-lanceolate. Corolla pubescent without; tube narrowly cylindric at the base for 7-9 mm then campanulate-infundibuliform for 7-10 mm; lobes produced into long, slender, pendulous appendages, 6-12 cm long; throat scales very short, densely papillose. Stamens included, subsessile; anthers lanceolate, acuminate, sagittate, 4-5 mm long, polliniferous in the upper half, shortly apiculate. Ovary of 2 free carpels, densely tomentose; style filiform, 10-12 mm long; stigma enclosed by the anthers, capitate, with a reflexed frill at the base. Fruit of 2 follicular mericarps eventually spreading at 180°; follicles 20-40 cm long and 2-3-5 cm broad at the base, tapering gradually to 5-8 mm and then abruptly expanding to 10-14 mm at the apex, brown, glabrous, longitudinally striate and markedly lenticellate. Seeds lanceolate-oblong, 14-16 mm long, tomentose, light brown; awn plumose, 10-15 cm long, with a naked stalk 3-4 cm long; cotyledons oblong; endosperm scanty.