Bass Strait is a strait separating the island state of Tasmania from the Australian mainland (more specifically the coast of Victoria, except for the land border across Boundary Islet). Excerpt: "NARRATIVE of an Expedition in the Colonial sloop Norfolk, from Port Jackson, through the Strait which separates Van Diemen's Land from New Holland, and from thence round the South Cape back to Port Jackson, completing the circumnavigation of the former Island, with some remarks on the coasts and harbors, by Matthew Flinders, 2nd lt, H.M.S. Reliance.*"