A Landlord's service of a notice to quit by prior arrangement with the tenant is no longer tantamount to a surrender, according to the House of Lords in Barrett v. Morgan [2000] 2 W.L.R. 284. Lord Millett's sensible judgment draws a clear distinction between the termination of a periodic tenancy by a notice to quit and the termination of a tenancy by surrender. It emphasises that the two processes are quite different, in origin and effect. The innocent reader may wonder why the House of Lords was called upon to affirm such an apparently unexceptional principle, but in the curious looking-glass world of leases, nothing can be taken for granted.