But now, in this Vale of Humiliation, poor Christian was hard put to it; for he had gone but a short way, when he saw a foul fiend come through the field to meet him: his name is Apollyon.
So he went on, and Apollyon met him. Now the ghoul did shock one's eyes to look on: he was clad with scales like a fish; he had wings like a huge bat, feet like a bear, and out of his throat came fire and smoke, and his mouth was as the mouth of the king of beasts. When he came up to Christian he gave him a look of scorn, and thus sought to sift him.
Apol.—"Whence came you? and to what place are you bound?"
Chr.—"I am come from the City of Destruction, which is the place of all ill, and am on my way to Mount Zion."
Apol.—"By this I know thou art one of my serfs; for all that land is mine; and I am the prince and god of it. How is it, then, that thou hast run off from thy king? Were it not that I hope thou wilt serve me yet more, I would strike thee now at one blow to the ground."
Chr.—"I was born, in sooth, in your realm, but to serve thee was hard, and your pay such as a man could not live on; 'for the meed of sin is death': for this cause, when I was come to years, I did, as some who think do, look out if so be I might mend my state. I have let my help to some one else; and to no less than the King of Kings."
Apol.—"Think yet, while thou art in cool blood, what thou art like to meet with in the way that thou dost go. Thou art not blind that for the most part those who serve him come to an ill end, for that they spurn my laws and walk not in my paths. What a host of them have been put to deaths of shame! And still thou dost count that to serve him is best; when, in sooth, he has not yet come from the place where he is, to save one that stood by his cause, out of my hands."
Chr.—"He does not seek so soon to save them, so as to try their love, and find if they will cleave to him to the end; and as for the ill end thou dost say they come to, that tells for their good: for to be set free now they do not much look for it; for they stay for their meed; and they shall have it when their Prince comes in the might of the bright hosts that wait on him."
Apol.—"Thou hast erst been false in thy turns to serve him; and how dost thou think to get pay of him?"