"cloth" = uniform

[Jonathan Lighter]

OED opines (def. 13) that this sense has been dead since 1823, but Rep. Joe Sistak (D.-Pa.) is living proof that it isn't.  He used to be an admiral and just remarked on Fox news that he "wore the cloth of this nation for thirty-one years."
 
JL




------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org