Laird of Noss, also a son of Jack, was a black pony, 38 inches high, with some white marks on his near side. He was a pony of somewhat lighter build and more upstanding carriage than Odin, with a finer head and less bone. He is best known as the sire of the famous horse Harold, of Duncan, and of Hector; and it is through them that his strain is perpetuated.
Jack’s other son, among the Londonderry sires, was Lord of the Isles, a pony which, like his brothers, was black, but was two inches smaller than they, his height being given as 36 inches. He was a thick and compact pony, less used in the stud than Odin, who appears to have been most approved by the stud management, as only sixty-three foals by Lord of the Isles are recorded against a hundred and nineteen by Odin. Lord of the Isles is chiefly interesting as the first instance of the introduction into the blood of the Londonderry sires of the cross of Prince of Thule, which has already been referred to. His dam Handy was a daughter of Prince of Thule; and it may perhaps have been from this source that his reduced size came, for Prince of Thule was himself only 36 inches high. It is significant, too, that Multum in Parvo, a brown horse 37 inches high, sired by Lord of the Isles out of his own dam Dandy, is described by those who knew Prince of Thule well as being exceedingly like him.
MULTUM IN PARVO (28.)
Multum in Parvo is probably the best-known son of Lord of the Isles, whose blood is otherwise mainly transmitted through the descendants of his daughters. He died in 1912 at the age of twenty-eight, having been foaled in 1884. His crest had latterly fallen over; but he still retained a singular air of distinction and a picturesque quality hardly to be discerned in many of the more massive ponies. He must always have lacked power and weight and strength of action; but his look of breeding, his quality, and the magnificent abundance and straightness of his curtain-like mane and forelock, attested an element in his breeding which should not be lost sight of.
This estimate of Lord of the Isles as a sire is borne out by the conspicuous qualities of his daughter Boadicea (998). This beautiful black mare, 36 inches high, is no doubt somewhat deficient in bone. But she stands almost by herself among Shetland ponies as an example, approaching closely to perfection, of what a riding-pony ought to be, with a small and exquisitely shaped head carried high on a clean-cut and well-arched neck, shoulders that would not disgrace a good thoroughbred, fine withers and short strong back, and the safe and easy action that properly belongs to an animal of her type.
Lord of the Isles’ name appears in the pedigrees of a large proportion of the best Shetland ponies, especially through his famous daughter Beauty (167); but apart from every other claim that he may have, and in spite of his perhaps too limited use in the Londonderry Stud, the fact that he is the sire of Multum in Parvo and of Boadicea entitles him to rank as a stallion of the first importance.
With these sons of Jack used in the Londonderry Stud must be mentioned his grandson Thor, now the sole survivor of the original Londonderry stallions. He is a son of Odin out of Fra (185), and is a brown horse 38 inches high. Like Lord of the Isles, he is related on his dam’s side to Prince of Thule, her sire; and he represents, therefore, almost the same combination of strains as Lord of the Isles. At twenty-seven years old he retains in a remarkable degree the vigour and vitality of youth. Slightly grey now over the cheekbones, and fallen a little in his spine, he still holds his crest erect, and moves with freedom, speed, and gaiety. He is perhaps a little larger in head than is desirable; but he is a pony of great substance and power, with abundance of well-shaped bone; and he displays very pure Shetland character. He was freely used in the Londonderry Stud, fifty-six of his foals being entered in the Stud-Book—a larger number than is credited to any other stallion except the sons of Jack.