Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a superior costermonger.

1895		Daily Tel. 14 May in Ware (1909) 12/2: And, indeed, if not in Walworth where should Mr Hawkins be supreme? It is the typical home, so to speak, of his race–a district traversed by that Old Kent-road in which their lyric hero ‘knocked’ the passers-by with the unexpected splendours of his attire and turn-out.
1909		J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.