nightcloth

A cloth placed over a birdcage, used to simulate the darkness of night and settle the bird(s) into sleep.

When the O’Haras were ten paces away, the bird suddenly swooped off the miner’s shoulder—the miner took no notice—and flew to a table on top of which reposed an elegant metal cage with a frilly nightcloth rolled up at the top. […] The fat woman rolled the nightcloth down over the cage and its nearly raped cockatoo and stalked off with it in high outrage.

Quiet settled over the manager’s office like the night[-]cloth over Sister Angela’s canary cage, leaving each one to brood on his or her own thoughts.

A nightgown.

(1895.) July 1, 1677.—Lady Mary Fletcher to her niece, Katherine Fleming. Pray tell your father that I omitted two suits of ribbon, a laced apron, and laced nightcloth, and a fan, all of which are necessaries as well as the smocks of which I said nothing.

The public was particularly unappreciative of the 1808-1814 Classic Head type which presented “a sleepy-looking Liberty turbaned with a diaphanous nightcloth,” and promptly dubbed her the “Blowsy Barmaid.”