An evergreen, subshrubby plant, 2 to 4 in. high, of tufted habit; branchlets slender, woody at the base only, glabrous, with leaves set twelve to sixteen to the inch. Leaves linear, 1⁄3 to 1 in. long, 1⁄16 to 1⁄6 in. wide, not toothed, bluntish at the tip, tapered at the base to a broad, membranous, flattened stalk, which clasps the stem and is margined with pale hairs. Flowers white, up to 1⁄2 in. wide, produced in May and June several together close to the ends of the shoots, each on a slender stalk 1⁄4 to 1 in. long. Corolla-tube very short, with four broad, spreading, veined lobes. Calyx deeply four-lobed.
Native of the South Island of New Zealand, up to altitudes of 4,500 ft. This is a charming dwarf plant for the rock garden, very hardy and covering itself with white flowers in May and June. The lower branches are procumbent and self-rooting. Although both Hooker and Cheeseman describe it as a herb, it is certainly woody at the base. The racemes are very distinct from those of the type common to the New Zealand hebes, the flowers being rarely more than four to a raceme, which may be 1 to 2 in. long, each blossom on a slender glabrous stalk which springs from the axil of a leaf-like bract and is one-third to half as long as the entire raceme.