DOWLAS, plain cloth, similar to sheeting, but usually coars er. It is made in several qualities, from line warp and weft to two warp and weft, and is used chiefly for aprons, pocketing, soldiers' gaiters, linings and overalls. The finer makes are some times made into shirts for workmen, and occasionally used for heavy pillow-cases. The word is spelt in many different ways, but the above is the common way of spelling adopted in factories, and it appears in the same form in the first part of Shakespeare's Henry IV., Act III. scene 3. The modern dowlas is a good strong and closely woven linen fabric.