Boma is a port town in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and located on the Congo River.

Banana is a small Atlantic seaport in present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo. The important port is located on the mouth of the Congo River, on Banana Creek and conveniently sheltered from the ocean.

Grand-Popo is a town in Benin (formerly Dahomey, 1600–1904). The town originally grew because of the slave trade. Today, most of the original town has been destroyed by coastal erosion.

Grand Bassam is town in Ivory Coast, and though originally a French colonial capital, it has remained an important seaport.

This area, on the shore of Ullswater, is likely where Wordsworth "stole" the boat in the famous scene described in Book 1 of the Prelude.  The "rocky steep" overhanging the boat is likely to have been Skybarrow Crag, and the cliff Wordsworth saw rearing up behind it was likely Glenridding Dodd.

Click here to go to the "Wordsworth: Poetry and Place" tool and see a "reenactment" of the boat stealing by myself and Nicole Bouchard (Baylor English PhD student).

Wordsworth studied at this small school in Hawkshead from 1779, when he moved to the village after his mother's death, until 1787, when he left to attend St. John's College at Cambridge University.  Established in 1585, the school would have held many boys at a time going through different grades of schooling.  The room was not always quiet: apparently, cock fights were sometimes staged inside the main room.  It seems to have been common practice for boys to carve their names into their desks, and Wordsworth was no exception.

After being "transplanted"  (Prelude 1805 1.308) to Hawkshead from Cockermouth following the death of his mother in 1778, Wordsworth lodged with Ann Tyson at this cottage. His sister Dorothy was sent to live with a series of other relatives, starting in Halifax.

The city of Brussels is the present-day capital of Belgium and the de-facto capital of the European Union. Brussels has been part of the Roman and Frankish empires as well as under rule by the Hapsburgs, the Spanish, and the Netherlands.

The Thames Estuary is located where the river Thames meets the North Sea. The estuary is part of a major shipping route, particularly to London.