2.3G SOUTH-WEST CAPE. 



Tasmania was not fully ascertained till the year 1798, 

 when the intrepid Bass, then surgeon of H.M.S. Re- 

 liance, while on a whale-boat cruise from Sydney, dis- 

 covered the strait which bears his name. Towards 

 10 A.M. steering E. by S. before a long rolling 

 sea, we passed about six miles from the S.W. Cape 

 of Tasmania. There was no opportunity at the 

 time of determining exactly the amount of error in 

 the position assigned to it in the present charts, but 

 we were satisfied that it was placed at least five miles 

 too far south. The Maatzuyker Isles, a group a 

 few miles to the south-east of this cape, are also in- 

 correctly laid down. The view of this headland 

 was of a very impressive and remarkable character, 

 and to add to the usual effect of its lonely and soli- 

 tary grandeur, a heavy sea still vexed and swelling 

 from the turbulence of the recent gale, was break- 

 ing in monotonous regularity against its white and 

 aged face ; rising a thousand feet precipitously 

 above the level of the sea, and terminating in a peak, 

 rendered yet more conspicuous by a deep gap 

 behind it. 



The adjacent coast had a singularly wild, bare, 

 and storm-beaten appearance. We beheld the 

 rugged and treeless sides of barren hills ; and here 

 and there, where vegetation struggled with sterility, 

 its stunted growth and northern inclination caused 

 by the prevailing winds testified to an ungenial 

 clime ; high, bare-faced peaks appeared occasion- 

 ally through the thick cl-ouds that girdled them, 



