Shakespeare uses _his_, _it_, and sometimes _its_, as possessive of
_it_.

In Milton's poetry (seventeenth century) _its_ occurs only three
times.

3 See heaven _its_ sparkling portals wide display--POPE


[Sidenote: _A relic of the olden time._]

82. We have an interesting relic in such sentences as this from
Thackeray: "One of the ways to know '_em_ is to watch the scared looks
of the ogres' wives and children."

As shown above, the Old English objective was _hem_ (or _heom_), which
was often sounded with the _h_ silent, just as we now say, "I saw
'_im_ yesterday" when the word _him_ is not emphatic. In spoken
English, this form '_em_ has survived side by side with the literary
_them_.


[Sidenote: _Use of the pronouns in personification._]

83. The pronouns _he_ and _she_ are often used in poetry, and
sometimes in ordinary speech, to personify objects (Sec. 34).