Gruffnesses [noun]

"No, of course not," said Stover with only outward gruffness.

But the managing editor, despite his accustomed gruffness and sharpness, was at heart the kindest of men.

"I don't believe in long engagements myself," he had said, with a certain suspicious gruffness in his tones.

The rugged lines softened, and when he turned to the men waiting for him, there was no gruffness in his voice.

He was exceedingly gruff and awkward, but no amount of gruffness could dismay James Mandeville.

His voice falls nearly an octave, lapsing from sweetness and purity to gruffness and volume.

The almost passionate tenderness and humanity which lay beneath his gruffness was undimmed.

With unnecessary gruffness, as I thought, he told me that I was not wanted, and the sooner I got ashore "out of it" the better.

"Get away, daughter," he grumbled, with that shade of gruffness which is but the transition to absolute surrender.

Their deportment was quiet and altogether unexceptionable,—no rudeness, no gruffness, nothing of menace.