In any case you couldn't use it or even refer to it....

I suppose that my friend quite felt that the document, however objectionable, should not, on literary grounds, be destroyed.

What my executors will think of me for having it in my possession, the Devil only knows." Whether this strain permeated the diary which Lady Mary left behind her when she eloped in 1712, and which was destroyed by one of her sisters, no one can say; but it is a curious fact that the diary she kept in later years was destroyed by her devoted daughter, Lady Bute.

"Though Lady Bute always spoke of Lady Mary with great respect," wrote Lady Louisa Stuart, "yet it might be perceived that she knew it had been too much her custom to note down and enlarge upon all the scandalous rumours of the day, without weighing their truth or even their probability; to record as certain facts stories that perhaps sprang up like mushrooms from the dirt, and had as brief an existence, but tended to defame persons of the most spotless character.

In this age, she said everything got into print sooner or later; the name of Lady Mary Wortley would be sure to attract curiosity; and were such details ever made public, they would neither edify the world, nor do honour to her memory." Lady Bute heard that her mother's letters were in existence, and, fearful of what they might contain, purchased them.