They are not promptly sent back for redemption to the banks issuing them, as should be done if they were typical bank notes.

They may circulate thousands of miles away from the bank that issued them, and for years after the bank has gone out of business.

They are not an "elastic currency," increasing or diminishing with the needs of business.

The changes in their amount depend upon the chance of the banks to make more or less in this way than by any other use of their capital, and this in turn depends largely on the price of bonds and on the rate of interest they bear.

From 1864 to 1870, fortunes were made from this source, but thereafter banks could make little more from note issues than they could by investing the same amount in other ways.