while her creator and the outside world could pick up all these slaving hints about Mrs Elton(nee Hawkins)...Emma again misjudges a lot about her,because of her social prejudices.

Augusta and her sister probably both had fortunes around the ten thousand pound mark. Her father and mother therefore left enough money -at least around twenty thousand pounds- for their dowries. Not insignificant sums( even if they were on the lower side of Emma's estimates). We are told in MP that ten thousand was the least amount of a dowry thought to be able to attract the attentions of a baronet.So the family were not so wealthy as the Woodhouses, or the Darcys ....but the Hawkins sisters were certainly better placed as regards their dowries than many of the women we meet in JAs novels.

Emma lets her affection, or non affection for a peron colour her opinions as to their origins.She is willfully blind. And I don't think she's correct to do this. Remember at Mr Martin ;-)