Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 69

In the time of the Goths, when John, the most blessed man and pontiff of this Roman Church, was journeying to Justin the elder emperor, he came into the regions of Corinth, where it became necessary that on the way a horse be sought for him to ride. A certain nobleman there, hearing this, offered him a horse which, on account of its great gentleness, his wife was accustomed to ride, on this condition: that when a suitable horse could be found for the traveller upon reaching other places, he should send back the one that had been given, for the sake of his wife. And so it was done, and the aforesaid man was carried up to a certain place borne by that same horse. As soon as he found another, he sent back the one he had received.

And when the wife of the aforesaid nobleman wished to ride it as before, she was no longer able, for after having borne so great a pontiff it refused to carry a woman. For it began, by an immense snorting and a fierce neighing, and by an unceasing movement of its whole body, as if in disdain, to make plain that after the members of a pontiff it could not bear a woman. Her husband, prudently observing this, forthwith sent it back to that same venerable man, entreating with great prayers that he himself should possess the horse which he had consecrated to his own use by sitting upon it.

Concerning him our elders are also wont to relate that marvel: that coming in the city of Constantinople to the gate which is called Golden, while crowds of people were meeting him, in the sight of all he restored sight to a blind man who begged it, and by the laying on of his hand he put to flight the darkness of his eyes.