Some 200,000 pints of Guinness are drunk at Puck Fair in Killorglin, Co Kerry, each year. That's roughly two pints for every man, woman and child who visits the fair.
But Puck Fair is about another "G" - a goat, not Guinness.
"The only place in the world where the goat reigns and the people act the goat," the festival chairman, Declan Mangan, said yesterday.
This year's brown goat was crowned - as he always is - by a young maiden at an August harvest fair. Sarah-Jane Joy (13), this year's Queen of Puck, performed the coronation ceremony at 7.30 p.m. yesterday, Gathering Day, as he was hoisted electronically 50 ft above the town where he will remain until Scattering Day tomorrow.
The pre-Christian origins of this three-day fair are not in doubt. Half-hearted explanations of the goat that warned the town of Cromwell's approach are sometimes put forward. But it is just as likely the wild mountain goat was prayed to in those desperate times.
There is no doubting the hold of Puck on the imagination locally.
Puck is e rang out last night "ar buile" . It is an old Norse word for a sprite, a goblin or a devil. But goats, like devils, are getting scarce. "There are very few of them now in the wild. It's a shame," Frank Joy said after he captured the billygoat in a dawn chase in the Kerry mountains on Monday.
The festival has become more sophisticated over the past decade. Safety barriers and walkie-talkies now feature for security reasons. There is a communications office and the parade is sponsored by the town's tele services and foreign exchange company, FEXCO. And the Queen of Puck is chosen for her essay-writing skills.
"The big danger now is that it will become too sophisticated. It would be a shame to kill the spontaneity," Mangan said.
But there was no fear of that yesterday as music flowed into the streets and stall sellers haggled. Len Qian, a reed flute player from Shangai, said The Beauty of Grassland was the most appropriate traditional Chinese melody for a goat. Otherwise it was sad love songs. Len Qian's brisk trade in CDs outside Nick's on Bridge Street was only equalled by the busy horse fair on Market Street.
Tony Hough, from outside Newcastle West, was not as impressed as some onlookers. Tony will be 70 next week and it was his 50th Puck Fair.
"The fair was a way better 20 years ago," said Tony.
Travellers gathered in their hundreds, pulling in with their caravans since before dawn.
"But it's hard to tell this year. A lot of the Travellers are getting well dressed," one garda remarked.
Killorglin native, Gerard Foley, reminisced about the days when his people were the Barons of Killorglin, exacting tolls from every farmer who pushed an animal over the bridge.
Men and women settled into the pints in the pubs, which will remain open long into the night, watched over by an August moon.
And the goat looked down.