Oporto wines of the earliest importation, which they have yet by them; and ’tis not only their own opinion, that the said Sir John Houblon’s and other merchant’s Oporto wines, which they have bought are superior, and do give us more general satisfaction: for the same is daily confirm’d by gentlemen and others of undoubted judgment and credit. Further this assertion deserves regard, viz. That the said Messieurs Brook and Helliers have bought of several merchants entire parcels of Oporto and Viana wines, red and white, good and bad, thereby continuing retailing, under the specious and fallacious pretences of natural red and neat of their own importing.
N.B.—The intentions of the above-named Vintners are not any way to reproach or diminish the reputation of their brethren, nor insinuate to their detriment, sympathizing with them. Note the aforesaid new natural Oporto wines, are to be sold by the aforesaid vintners at £16 per hogshead, at 18d. per quart, without doors, and at 20d. per quart, within their own houses.
Brook & Hellier, whose wine is spoken of so slightingly, kept the Bumper Tavern in Covent Garden, which had formerly belonged to Dick Estcourt. They seem quite able to bear what has been said of them, for they have the Spectator, who has evidently tasted, and quite as evidently liked their wines, at their back, one of the numbers of this disinterested periodical being devoted almost entirely to their praise. The Spectator was by no means averse to a bit of good genuine puffery, and Peter Motteux, formerly an author who had dedicated a poem or two to Steele, and who at that time kept one of the Indian warehouses so much in fashion, received kindnesses in its columns more than once. So did Renatus Harris the organ-builder, who competed with Smith for the Temple organ, and many others. So it is not extraordinary that their advertisement is found in the Spectator very shortly after that just quoted. They seem, however, to have been disinclined to quarrel, as their notice makes no mention of their rivals:—