The hanging judge woke at midday With fetid breath and tombstone decay Stubble scratch, cold floor feet He cursed the whore twixt his crumpled sheets The hanging judge is hanging today The hanging judge is hanging today The Hanging Judge gin to fix His gouty leg and twitching ticks Belching broad he greets the day "Today" says he "is hanging day" The hanging judge is hanging today The hanging judge is hanging today Over nightshirt coarse and stained His threadbare robes he dons again Through cobble streets, gable crowned He makes his way through London town Fortified with a glass of port he raps the bench "Silence in court" His birdlike clerk hovers by, "Guilty has charged, hang 'hem high"