6. At what time it must be served. It must be given six months before the expiration of the lease at common law. 1 Term, 159 ; 3 id. 13 ; 8 Cow. N. Y. 13 ; 1 Vt. 311 ; 1 Dan. Ky. 30 ; 5 Yerg. Tenn. 431 ; 4 Ired. No. C. 291 ; 17 Mass. 287 ; see 2 Pick. Mass. 70, 71 ; 8 Serg. & R. Penn. 458 ; 2 Rich. So. C. 346 ; and three months is the common time under statutory regulations ; and where the letting is for a shorter period the length of notice is regulated by the time of letting. 6 Bingh. 362 ; 5 Cush. Mass. 563 ; 23 Wend. N. Y. 616. Difficulties sometimes arise as to the period of the commencement of the tenancy ; and when a regular notice to quit on any particu lar day is given, and the time when the term began is unknown, the effect of such notice, as to its being evidence or not of the com mencement of the tenancy, will depend upon the particular circumstances of its delivery : if the tenant, having been applied to by his landlord respecting the time of the com mencement of the tenancy, has informed him it began on a certain day, and in conse quence of such information a notice to q :it on that day is given at a subsequent period, the tenant is concluded by his. act, and will not be permitted to prove that in point of fact the tenancy has a different commence ment ; nor is it material whether the inform ation be the result of design or ignorance, as the landlord is in both instances equally led into error. Adams, Ej. 130 ; 2 Esp. 635 ; 2 Phillipps, Ev. 186. In like manner, if the tenant at the time of delivery of the notice assent to the terms of it, it will waive any irregularity as to the period of its expira tion ; but such assent must be strictly proved. 4 Term, 361 ; 2 Phillipps, Ev. 183. When the landlord is ignorant of the time when the term commenced, a notice to quit may be given not specifying any particular day, but ordering the tenant in general terms to quit and deliver up the possession of the pre mises at the end of the current year of his tenancy thereof, which shall expire next after the end of three months from the date of the notice. See 2 Esp. C. 589.
11. What will amount to a waiver of the no tice. The acceptance of rent accruing subse quently to the expiration of the notice is the most usual means by which a waiver of it may be produced ; but the acceptance of such rent is open to explanation ; and it is the pro vince of the jury to decide with what views and under what circumstances the rent is paid and received. Adams, Ej. 139 ; 2 Campb. 387. If the money be taken with an express de claration that the notice is not thereby in tended to be waived, or accompanied by other bircumstances which may induce an opinion that the landlord did not intend to continue the tenancy, no waiver will be produced by the acceptance: the rent must be paid and received as rent, or the notice will remain in force. Cowp. 243. The notice may also be waived by other acts of the landlord ; but they are generally open to explanation, and the particular act will or will not be a waiver of the notice, according to the circumstances which attend it. 2 East, 236 ; 10 id. 13 ; 1 Term, 53. lt has •been held that a notice to quit at the end of a certain year is not waived by the landlord's permitting the tenant to re main in possession an entire year after the expiration of the notice, notwithstanding the tenant held by an improving lease,—that is, to clear and fence the land and pay the taxes. 1 Binn. Penn. 833. In cases, how ever, where the act of the landlord cannot be qualified, but must of necessity be taken as a confirmation of the tenancy, as if he distrain for rent accruing after the expira tion of the notice, or recover in an action for use and ocupation, the notice of course will be waived. Adams, Ej. 144 ; 11. Blackst. 311 ; 6 Term, 219 ; 19 Wend. N. Y. 391. See 13 C. B. 178.