(Germ. Kuhreigen), a simple and beautiful melody which the Swiss herdsmen play on the Alpine horn when driving out and in their herds to the pasture. Consisting, as it does, of a few simple intervals, the effect of it is quite enrapturing when heard among the echoes of the Swiss mountains. The native Swiss are said to be seized with inexpressible longings to return to their native country when they hear it played in a foreign land. This nostalgia or homesickness, as experienced by the Swiss soldier abroad, is elegantly alluded to by Rogers in his Pleasures of Memory, part i., p. 19:—

"The intrepid Swain, who guards a foreign shore, Condemned to climb his mountain-slope no more, If chance he hears the song so sweet, so wild, His heart would spring to hear it when a child, Melts at the long-lost scenes that round him rise, And sinks a martyr to repentant sighs."

(See Recherches sur les Ranz des Vaches, by Tarenne, Paris, 1813; Sammlung von Schweizer Kuhreigen und Volksliedern, Berne, 1818; also a Dissertatio de Nostalgia, by Th. Zwinger, Basle, 1710.)