Let Them Eat Cake

Three hundred and fifty years after its founding, the city of Boston yesterday wrapped up a summer of birthday festivities by eating ice cream and a birthday cake of nearly a ton and by watching a parade of G.I.s, ex-Vietnam POWs, Cub Scouts and marching bands.

The Stanford University Band also marched before its "Baby Float," a Cadillac dragging red-spattered dolls and a "California Hedonism" display, two soakers in a hot tub on top of a car.

While some of the thousands of celebrants wolfed golden cake with chocolate icing, Don Leslie swallowed swords. After gulping a 19-inch sword to the gags of those who looked on, Leslie said, "The human body is built to take it. We're all potential sword swallowers."