‘In Plantagenet days,’ says Mr. Maurice Healy, K.C., ‘there were only six houses in the City of London licensed for the sale of Bordeaux wine. One of these was in Lombard Street. It was a hostelry known before the Great Fire as the “White Bear,” or “Great Bear.” It was at this house that Pepys first drank Haut Brion (which he called Ho Bryon)… After the Great Fire, Monsieur de Pontac who owned the Château Haut Brion, set up an eating house on the site of this hostelry, which under the name of Pontack’s became the most famous eating house of Stuart days.’
