An erect, branched shrub, 1-2.5 m tall, roughly hairy. Leaves opposite, rarely in whorls of 3, ovate to ovate-sublanceolate, shortly petiolate, or subsessile, (2-) 3-6 (-9) cm long, (1.5-) 2-4 cm broad, crenate-serrate, acute, often rugose, scabrid above, softly and densely pubescent below with minute glands hidden within the pubescence. Spikes ovoid to short, cylindrical, (1-) 2-3 (-5) cm long, 1-2 cm broad, slightly increasing in fruit, pedunculate with peduncles exceeding the leaves, axillary. Bracts 5-10 mm long, 4-8 mm broad, ovate, acuminate, softly pubescent. Flowers 3-5 mm across, whitish, or pinkish, often with yellowish tube. Calyx 6-8 mm long, pubescent. Corolla 10-15 mm long with tube as long as the calyx, pubescent outside; lobes 4, subrounded, somewhat oblique. Drupe 3-5 mm in diameter, globose, glabrous, purplish with a 2-celled stone, usually having 1 seed in each cell.

Fl. Per.: July-September.

Type: From seed collected by B. Heyne from Mysore and cultivated at the Botanic Garden, Calcutta.

Distribution: Pakistan and India.

It has often been confused with S. African, Lantana rugose Thunb., but the plants have less rugose leaves and flowers not red. Moldenke (Personal correspon¬dence) considers R.R. Stewart 13616 and Bis Ram 828, to belong to this species, which seems doubtful. Leaves used as a cure for snake-bite.