Brewer's: Reel

Right off the reel. Without intermission. A reel is a device for winding rope. A reel of cotton is a certain quantity wound on a bobbin. (Anglo-Saxon reol.)

Reel

A Scotch dance. (Gaelic, righil.)

“We've been travelling best part of twenty-four hours right off the reel.” —Boldrewood: Robbery under Arms, chap. xxxi.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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