Blind alleys, courts, or bye-ways; perhaps from the houses built there being cribbed out of the common way or passage; and islands, from the similarity of sound to the Caribbee Islands.
Definition taken from The 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, originally by Francis Grose.
Cribbage-faced * CrimNathan Bailey's 1736 Dictionary of canting and thieving slang
John S. Farmer's collection of canting songs and slang rhymes