Your quotes make me recapture a thought I have had more than once. I know people not directly involved in the story seldom make appearances, except as comic relief, or to tell us general information of the society, but there seems a paucity of marriageable people of both genders in Highbury. Was it such a 'lucky guess' of Emma's that Miss Taylor and Mr. Weston would get together, or was there really, as it seems sometimes, no one else to plot for?

Same with Mr. Elton and Harriet: Emma does not seem to choose amongst a half dozen young ladies for Mr. Elton. It almost seems as if Highbury has few fair flowers to tempt him. And Harriet has another young man in her sights, but he is, properly speaking, a farmer from outside Highbury, and, but for an accident of his sisters knowing Harriet, the two would never have met. Harriet appears not to know many young men, not to have the occasion to meet many.