On Tue, 6 Apr 2004, Greg Morrow wrote: > Philip Hart wondered aloud to the group: > >So why > > the army's strength was sufficient > >but not > > the strength of the army's was sufficient [...] > > It's different semantic content. The former is possessive, the strength > that the army possesses; the latter is an origin, the strength that comes > from the army. The difference isn't very significant, but grammar, so I > understand, often makes very big hay out of narrow distinctions. I don't get this. Also, I just tried to list the genitive pronouns and hit a problem: "I saw Mabel, then I saw a friend of hers at the store." "I saw the alien, then I saw a friend of its at the store."