The Entail; or, The Lairds of Grippy
He heard of the acceleration with which the indisposition of Mrs. Walkinshaw was proceeding to a crisis, and, knowing the sentiments of his brother-in-law with respect to male heirs, he could not disguise to himself the hazard that he ran of seeing his son cut out from the succession to the Kittlestonheugh estate; and the pang of this thought was sharpened and barbed by the reflection, that he had himself contributed and administered to an event which, but for the marriage, would probably have been procrastinated for years, during which it was impossible to say what might have happened.