TRADITIONS OF ST. JOHN'S TALK. Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons, in 177 had been a pupil of Polycarp, who in his youth had many conversations with St. John, who died about 100. Irenæus writes to a friend thus: "I can tell the very place in which the blessed Polycarp used to sit when he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings in, and his manner of life, and his personal appearance, and the discourses which he held before the people, and how he would describe his intercourse with John and with the rest of those who had seen the Lord, and how he would relate their words. And whatsoever things he had heard from them about the Lord, and about His miracles, and about His teaching, Polycarp, as having received them from eyewitnesses of the life of the Word, would relate altogether in accordance with the Scriptures. To these things I used to listen at the time with attention, by God's mercy, which was bestowed upon me, noting them down, not on paper, but in my heart; and constantly, by the grace of God, I reflect upon them faithfully." Irenæus says Polycarp told him the story of St. John and Cerinthus. Polycarp, at the age of eighty-six, was ordered to be burnt; but it is said that the fire would not consume his body, which shone like silver, and he was then despatched with a dagger. The Roman pro-consul had ordered him to forswear and revile Christ. But the answer was: "Eighty-and-six years have I served Him, and He hath done me no wrong. How, then, can I speak evil of my King, who saved me?" A MIRACLE PERFORMED BY ST. JOHN AFTER DEATH. A miracle attributed to St. John, and represented by some sacred artists, related to the Empress Galla Placidia. She was returning from Constantinople to Ravenna with her two children during a terrible storm. In her fear and anguish she vowed to St. John that if she landed safely she would dedicate to his honour a magnificent church. Both events happened; but still, owing to there being no relic to deposit in her church, she remained somewhat dissatisfied. John, however, took pity upon her; for one night, as she prayed earnestly, he appeared to her in a vision, and when she threw herself at his feet to embrace and kiss them he disappeared, but left one of his sandals in her hand, and this has been long preserved. The ancient church at Ravenna of Galla Placidia contained some mosaics, now vanished, but two bas-reliefs refer to the sandal. ST. JOHN AND EDWARD THE CONFESSOR.