Definition of "on end"

on end

prepositional phrase
1. (idiomatic) without interruption, without stopping, continuously
  Quotations
  The arrangement of some seats facing and some one behind the other, bus fashion, seems a sensible compromise; I am one of those who do not enjoy staring at my fellow travellers for perhaps hours on end.
  1964 July, Mary Allen, “A Woman's View of the New Coaches”, in Modern Railways, page 9
2. upright; erect; endways
  Quotations
  How silent, on the other hand, lie all Cotton-trades and such like; not a steeple-chimney yet got on end from sea to sea!
  1843 April, Thomas Carlyle, “chapter 5, ’’Twelfth Century’’”, in Past and Present, American edition, Boston, Mass.: Charles C[offin] Little and James Brown, published 1843, book II (The Ancient Monk)
  When he was dried he struggled into his shirt. Then, ruddy and shiny, with hair on end, and his flannelette shirt hanging over his pit-trousers, he stood warming the garments he was going to put on.
  1913, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, chapter 8, in Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. […]