Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes
Savagely slaughter’d: to relate the manner,
Were, on the quarry of these murder’d deer,
To add the death of you.
– William Shakespeare
Macbeth, Act 4, Scene 3. Ross has the unenviable task of delivering the news to Macduff about the slaughter of his family in Scotland. At first he is unable to do so, twice lying that they are well when Macduff asks about them. Here he eventually tells Macduff that his wife and babies were murdered in their home. In this passage deer is a metaphor for Macduff’s family.