Abram cove

plural Abram coves · alternative Abraham-cove · alternative Abraham cove

1. UKobsoletethieves' cantSynonym of Abraham man.

   Duds and Cheats thou oft hast won, / […] / Cank and Dommerar thou couldst play, / Or Rum-maunder in one day; / And like an Abram-cove couldst pray, / Yet pass with Jybes well jerk'd away.

   1869, William Hugh Logan, A pedlar's^([sic]) pack of ballads and songs

   3 more examples

   "Curse him, Squire," croaked Chinnery, "don't suffer such an Abram cove to play the counterfeit crank. If he were to refuse to booze it at the George in White Friars, the Bear and Harrow in Chancery Lane, the Setting Dog and Partridge in Jackanapes Alley, or any of the loyal houses in London, they would mill him with a filch, or give him a worse Rose-Alley salutation than Johnny Dryden's."

   1827, Horace Smith, Reuben Apsley, page 121

   What, you — you bit av a beak and trail. Ecod, but Bess is meat for your master, and that's me, as you'll soon know. She's an old wench o' mine, and I'll buss her when I choose, and ask no leave of an Abram cove of corporal like you afore I run you through the body."

   1902, Herbert Compton, A Free Lance in a Far Land, page 94

   So loathly was he and verminous they scarce could seize and bind him, but when haled before the magistrate he proved to be an abram-cove named Jacques Roulet, who with his brother Jean and a cousin Julien[…]

   1933, Montague Summers, The Werewolf

   Synonyms: Abraham man