Green’s Dictionary of Slang

dover n.1

[proprietary name]

(Aus.) a clasp-knife; thus flash one’s dover, to use one’s clasp-knife to cut up one’s food.

Show quotations
[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 9 May 5/4: It didn’t take him long to find out what was wrong. He prized open the case with his ‘dover,’ and his eye glittered with the light of triumph as he exclaimed, ‘Holy Frost, if there aint a horsehair got twisted up in it! And, my oath, it’s stuck pretty tight too.’.
[Aus] ‘Sam Holt’ in ‘Banjo’ Paterson Old Bush Songs 73: You were flashing your dover, six short months ago, / In a lambing camp on the Barcoo.
[Aus]G. Seagram Bushman All 198: Got a new dover, have you? What’s the brand?
[NZ] (ref. to 1890–1910) L.G.D. Acland Early Canterbury Runs (1951) 374: Dover – AE gives the meaning as a clasp knife.
[Aus]G. Seal Lingo 161: sport for show or for display is from 18th-century cant, a dover was a favoured brand of knife while a monkey was a sheep.

In phrases

run of one’s dover (n.) [development of orig. mid-19C phr. run of one’s knife]

(Aus.) board and lodging.

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[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 11 Apr. 22/1: Now, this maid from the country had been to the city / To visit a friend, and soon became pretty / Well versed in the ways of the vot’ress of fashion / Who dwelt in the town, and cut a great dash on / ‘Ten bob a week and the run of their ’Dover’ ’ / (That is plenty to eat and a little bit over).