Swanning in the Public Garden

“City parks are for pleasure. Boston’s Public Garden is a gentle park and the pleasure comes from the tulip beds’ swatches of color that proclaim the spring, from the roses that follow, and from the all-summer contrast of shade and sunlight under the great trees. The action is provided by the Swan Boats, which made their first voyage in the lagoon in 1877, and have been circling the tiny island ever since.’’

 -- The late Atlantic Monthly editor Edward Weeks, for his essay “The Swan Boats of Boston,’’ in Arthur Griffin’s New England: The Four Seasons. The Atlantic was founded in, and based for many years in, Boston.