Green’s Dictionary of Slang

cobbler n.1

[based on an old joke, quoted in OED: ‘In the harvest field English rustics used to say, when picking up the last sheaf, “This is what the cobbler threw at his wife.” “What?” “The last.”’]
(Aus./N.Z.)

1. a sheep with a hard and dirty fleece, thus difficult to shear; the last and least willing sheep to be sheared.

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[Aus]Stephens & O’Brien Materials for a Dict. of Aus. Sl. (1900–10) [unpub. ms.] n.p.: Your hands are far too soft and smooth / At shearing for to shine, / For there’s hard and sandy cobblers / On the banks of the River-ine.
[Aus]Queanbeyan Age (NSW) 13 Jan. 2/6: Shearing operations have just terminated at Molonglo — the ‘cobbler’ of the season having been divested of his fleece at Carwoola on Thursday, the 30th ultimo.
[Aus]Aus. Town & Country Jrnl (Sydney) 21 Aug. 368/4: You have invited replies to a correspondent’s question as to the largest number of sheep shorn in one day by one man [...] S. M. M. (Bowral) gives the numbor 140 or 160 ‘rosellas,’ and 80 wodders or ‘cobblers,’ at Sir T. A. Murray’s station.
[Aus]Worker (Brisbane) 4 Sept. 8/4: But one poor beast, I must declare, he positively hates, / And tries his best through ev’ry ‘run’ to leave him for his mates! / l mean the wrinkly ‘cobbler’ who by everyone is passed, / And left inside the catching-pen until the very last.
[Aus] (ref. to 1860s) ‘Rolf Boldrewood’ In Bad Company 315: The last flock was ‘on the battens,’ and amid ironical congratulations the ‘cobbler’ (or last sheep) was seized.
[Aus]E.S. Sorenson ‘Shearer and Rouseabout’ in Life in the Aus. Backblocks 245: This enclosure is not refilled until the last sheep, called the cobbler, is caught, and each of the mates shows his generosity by trying hard to let go first, so as to leave him for the other.
[UK]A. Wright Gamblers’ Gold (1931) 7: Early in the afternoon the last rough ‘cobbler’ lost his matted fleece, and the shed was ‘cut out’.
[NZ] (ref. to 1890–1910) L.G.D. Acland Early Canterbury Runs (1951) 369: Cobbler – Shearers’ slang. Worst sheep to shear in a pen.
[Aus]Baker Aus. Lang. 63: Cobbler, a dirty, sticky, matted and wrinkly sheep (not always the last, but often left to the last in shearing).
[NZ]G. Meek ‘The Ringer’ Station Days in Maoriland 103: We had little time the cobbler to peruse.
[Aus]Sydney Morn. Herald 14 Nov. 2/9: ‘Cobbler’ [...] [...] the last sheep in the pen [...] came to mean a tough sheep to shear.

2. (also cobbler note) in ext. use, one’s last bit of money [pun on SE cobbler’s last].

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[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 6 Sept. 29/2: So I played the giddy goat, / Till I cashed me cobbler note; / Then I saddled up me neddies an’ I mounted for a jump. / Jump – at a jump, I cleared the bar an’ pump; / But I rode for landlord’s winnings – like many another chump.
[Aus]G. Seagram Bushman All 228: Well, old man, as it’s the bloomin’ cobbler [...] keep it .

SE in slang uses

In compounds

cobbler’s knot (n.)

a lock of hair shaped like the figure six and twisted from the temple back towards the ear.

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, , [UK]Hotten Sl. Dict.
cobbler’s punch (n.)

a mixture consisting of treacle, vinegar, gin and water.

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[UK]Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue ms. additions .
, [UK]Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (2nd, 3rd edn).
[UK]Lex. Balatronicum.
[UK]Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
[UK]Worcs. Chron. 4 Nov. 4/4: Not forgetting an abundance of that favourite compound known in the trade as ‘cobbler’s punch’.
[UK]Lancaster Gaz. 29 Apr. 3/3: Cobbler’s Punch— This is a liquor composed of gin and cider.
[UK]Manchester Courier 24 July 14/4: In the same novel [i.e. Our Mutual Friend] Mr Wegg, one evening paying a visit to Mr Venus’s museum, finds its proprietor carousing on cobbler’s punch.