From the Middle Ages to the twentieth century a multitude of Scots flocked to the most immense country history has known. They came from every neuk of Scotland and their field of action was Russia’s whole expanse from the Baltic to Alaska, from the Arctic to the Chinese frontiers. They knew that for sheer vastness and potential she was unsurpassed as the land of opportunity. She sheltered and fostered many a braw lad, and some of them became the most famous men of the Diaspora. One need only recall the names of Peter the Great’s principal advisor, General Patrick Gordon of Auchleucheries, Aberdeen (1635-1699); Prince Mikhail Barclay de Tolly, commander-in-chief in the Napoleonic wars, or Mikhail Lermontov, the poet whose forebears sprang from county Fife. It was not a one-way street, and we must not forget Russian visitors to Scotland. More of these have pursued the road to the isles than could be expected, including members of the Romanov dynasty and major figures like Princess Yekaterina Dashkova, the writers Alexander and Ivan Turgenev, Admiral Fiodor Lütke, revolutionary Prince Piotr Kropotkin, chemist Dmitry Mendeleyev and philosopher Vladimir Solovyev, to name a few. But the flow in the opposite direction was by far the mightier. Hundreds of Scottish names became distinguished in Russian history, industrial development and culture. They often stood for families of many generations, veritable clans. An envious English engineer observed in 1805 that "to come from the North side of the Tweed is the best recommendation a man can bring to this city [St. Petersburg], the Caledonian Phalanx being the strongest and most numerous, and moving always in the closest union". Besides, a substantial Scottish element abided in Moscow (the local British church is consecrated to St. Andrew), Kronshtadt, Archangel and Riga as well as in missions in the Caucasus, Crimea, Astrakhan, Orenburg and Selenginsk near lake Baikal.