The country where deposit banking is most diffused is Scotland, and there the original profits were entirely derived from the circulation.

The note issue is now a most trifling part of the liabilities of the Scotch banks, but it was once their mainstay and source of profit.

A curious book, lately published, has enabled us to follow the course of this in detail.
The Bank of Dundee, now amalgamated with the Royal Bank of Scotland, was founded in 1763, and had become before its amalgamation, eight or nine years since, a bank of considerable deposits.

But for twenty-five years from its foundation it had no deposits at all.

It subsisted mostly on its note issue, and a little on its remittance business.