Lady Mary's primary concern with her engagement was financial, not romantic. Lady Mary denied transient emotions guiding her life: "I can esteem, I can be a friend, but I don’t know whether I can love." Then, after setting forth all her terms, including her deference, she warned to Edward that "Make no answer to this, if you can like me on my own terms" and that his proposals not be made for her. However, these correspondences soon endangered Edward. In one particular letter, Edward wrote, "Her being better in 1710, the consequence of its being known that I write to her." A servant in Lady Mary's household found this letter and gave it to her father; this letter put her father "in the utmost rage." However, Wortley was flattered that Lady Mary "had given the father as ‘an artifice to bring the affair to a proper conclusion.’" The next day, Wortley called Lady Mary’s father about a formal proposal. Mary's father, now Marquess of Dorchester had insisted on one condition in the marriage contract: "that Wortley’s estate be entailed on the first son born to him." However, Wortley refused to do this as it would require £10, 000.