SPELLING

BEE  , a match in which two sides contest in accuracy of spelling . The custom, an old one, was revived in the schools of the United States about the year 1873, and rapidly spread throughout the country and to Great Britain, enjoying for a few years an extraordinary vogue, not only in schools, but in all classes and ages of society . In the United States inter-city and inter-state matches were not unknown . According to the generally recognized rules a competitor who misspelled a word retired, and the match was won by the side having the greatest number of survivors at the close . The use of the word " bee " as an assemblage of persons for the purpose of joint work or play originated in America in colonial times, and was taken from the labour of the bees of a hive . Familiar examples of it are husking-bee and quilting-bee, assemblages of villagers for the purpose of helping a neighbour with the husking of the corn or his wife with her quilt-making .