] That really does seem to suggest that A lady's pin money depended upon the fortune she brought into the marriage, doesn't it? Which makes for a very hard question about Lizzy's source of income, since Lizzy only has fifty pounds a year from her parents. Assuming that Mrs B does actually know what she's talking about, though, I suppose it's probable that Lizzy 's marriage settlement cites an amount of money given to her by Darcy himself. I do wonder how one would negotiate such a thing.

Since, as you said, this would mean that several of Austen's heroines (if pin money was taken exclusively from the bride's portion) would be operating on extremely tiny amounts considering their situation in life. It's hard to picture the mistress of Pemberley having a grand total of 50 pounds p.a. to do her shopping etc with, similarly for the Dashwood girls, at least Marianne, who marries 2,000 pounds a year but whose fortune is the same as Lizzy's. Fanny Price might not have anything! I tend to believe that Mrs. Bennet must be right, though, and that there are ways in which the husband's property can produce pin money for his wife - after all, who has more intense interest in marriage settlements and customs than she does?

I'm inclined to guess that there must have been some sort of option where the husband could possible buy a property or set aside some amount of his capital for his wife; not that she'd be able to dispose of it, but just so that she could have the income off of it and make the bookkeeping easier to manage. Just my wild guess, though. Does anyone have any ideas?