* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: Gabriel Betteridge's obsession with ''Literature/RobinsonCrusoe'', down to reading it every year and finding new insights each time, could be seen as a parody of evangelical Christians who regularly re-read the Bible in search of new meanings and interpretations.
* FairForItsDay: Although all of the protagonists describe the Hindu priests who have tracked the Moonstone down as exotic, frightening, and untrustworthy, Collins still presents their claim to the Moonstone as true and valid, and [[spoiler: its eventual return to them]] is shown as the setting right of an old wrong.
* SugarWiki/FunnyMoments:
** All of Drusilla Clack's narrative. Apparently even Collins thought so; he wrote those passages out during a ''very'' dark period in his life, and writing them out cheered him up enough to keep going.
** When Ezra Jennings [[SwitchingPOV as the narrator]] meets Gabriel Betteridge. The delightful OldRetainer of past chapters becomes a proto-{{Otaku}} for ''Literature/RobinsonCrusoe''!
* HoYay: There's a very strong connection between Rosanna Spearman and Limping Lucy. It seems especially pronounced on Lucy's side - she talks about how she and Rosanna were going to move to the city and "live like sisters," calls Rosanna "my darling".
* JerkassWoobie: Unlikeable as Miss Clack is, she is trapped by 19th century convention in a position of permanent poverty, social exclusion and dependency.
* TheScrappy: Miss Clack. Her HolierThanThou attitude can be just a bit too close to real life for some readers.
** Ironically, at the time (and for some today) it was the exact opposite. Readers enjoyed her as a parody of the kind of HolierThanThou people they knew in real life.
* ValuesDissonance:
** The way Betteridge describes the treatment of his (shrewish and contrary) late wife.
** The depiction of the Brahmin priests.
* TheWoobie:
** [[BrokenBird Rosanna Spearman]].
** [[YourDaysAreNumbered Ezra Jennings]].
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