table-cloth, noun

Origin:
EnglishShow more Figurative use of general English.
The layer of cloud which often covers the top of Table Mountain and cascades down its slopes. Also attributive.
1634, 1731 [see table].
1764 Mrs Kindersley Letters (1777) 58The Table-land..before a gale of wind, is always covered with a thick cloud, which the people call the devil’s table-cloth.
1791 Encycl. Brit. VII. 16The Table Land or Mountain is sometimes suddenly capped with a white cloud, by some called ‘the spreading of the Table-cloth’.
1797 Lady A. Barnard Lett. to Henry Dundas (1973) 37Table Mountain over which a white damask table cloth had been spread half way down shewd its broad face and smiled.
1804 R. Percival Acct of Cape of G.H. 129It is a common observation with the Dutch to say..‘that the Devil is going to dinner and he has laid the cloth on Table Mountain.’
1829 C. Rose Four Yrs in Sn Afr. 7The table-cloth on the Table Mountain, and the South-east wind that it denotes.
1834 W.H.B. Webster Narr. of Voy. to Sn Atlantic Ocean 322There is a remarkable circumstance connected with the south-east wind at Cape Town, viz. the dense mantle of vapour which rests upon Table Mountain, and rushes over its precipitous sides like a cataract..This peculiar appearance is called by the inhabitants the Table-cloth.
1852 A.W. Cole Cape & Kafirs 24A great white cloud is approaching us — ‘the devil’s table-cloth’ by all that is fearful!
1882 C. Du Val With Show through Sn Afr. I. 50Stealing over the top of Table Mountain was a white filmy vapour, known as the ‘table-cloth’, the certain precursor of the ‘south-easter.’
1898 E. Prov. Herald 2 Aug.A Real Table-Cloth. The weather has been very boisterous..snow fell heavily on Table Mountain. The ridges of the face of the mountain are covered with hail and presents a pretty sight.
1905 Addresses & Papers (Brit. & S. Afr. Assoc. Agric. Science) I. 287 (Pettman)South-easters are three kinds..(1) ‘Table Cloth’ south-easters (2) ‘Blind’ south-easters (3) Black south-easters.
1926 P.W. Laidler Tavern of Ocean 193An ever-tumbling cataract of cloud that never succeeds in reaching the city below — a phenomenon which the English named ‘the table-cloth,’ but which was likened by the French to a white powdered wig, ‘la perruque’.
1944 J. Mockford Here Are S. Africans 45The legend grew that..a retired pirate..had smoked for many days in competition with a sulphurous stranger on Devil’s Peak, smoked until the stranger collapsed, smoked until Table Mountain was covered by its famous cloudy tablecloth.
1963 K. Mackenzie Dragon to Kill 88Table Mountain was covered with its tablecloth of cloud.
1971 Argus 24 July 9Cape Town has two tablecloths — a natural white cloth of cloud resting on the top of Table Mountain, and a dark spread of man-made smoke suspended low over the harbour area.
1991 A. Jay on Radio 5, 9 MayThere’s a tablecloth on the mountain, and all us Vaalies are going ape.
1993 C. Eden in Food & Home Aug. 138Seagulls wheeling in the wide blue bowl of the sky, the South-Easter nudging the tablecloth over Table Mountain.
The layer of cloud which often covers the top of Table Mountain and cascades down its slopes. Also attributive.
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table, nounn.tackie, takkie, nounn.
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