Then there was an old-clothes man of Hebraic origin ; a fully-costumed darkey waiter, dispensing delicious liquors from a tray ; countless clowns and placarded unfathomables ; a poor, droning blind man ; a midnight reveller with the essential lamp post ; a valiant huntsman ; an escaped convict, № 27395 ; and — not least by any means — a goat. It was a real goat, real enough to have balking and butting tendencies. Ted Fritchey had him in charge, and underwent many a harrowing experience with his haedine protégé. This goat was intended to be prophetic of a victory over Chicago on the morrow — a capture of Chicago’s goat. Of the fulfillment of the prophecy, more hereafter. It is enough to say that on this afternoon our minds were all overborne with anxiety, and our hearts were all tight with goatish desire.
Source: wiktionary