Modern American scholarship in the humanities owes its largest debt to nineteenth-century German scholarship. Yet, the Americans' struggle to assimilate German learning was difficult and protracted. During the 1800s American students traveled to German universities in increasing numbers. The first generation studied mainly philology. Though they were attracted by the humanistic vision that had fired Humboldt and Herder, they could not reconcile it with the practice of scholarship. Few returned to America with usable skills.