Brusque and surly

Usage examples of gruffy.

He had a bellowing, gruffy voice and wore a blue and white wool athletic jacket whose padded shoulders made him look gigantic.

It trumpets gruffy into the ear of the night, and its shadow passes under my feet.

He had pulled the curls over his eyes, and tied up his face with a great handkerchief over the cap, as Gruffy has been doing lately when she had the face-ache, and he went about among the little chaps in such a motherly, bustling way, it was quite affecting.

Saia, her Italian gruffy father, the grounds keeper, was off today, doubtless.

The innkeeper hailed him in a gruffy, sing-song manner, wrinkling his stump of a nose like a charging bull, and running a hand through his greasy hair to make it stick upwards in a haphazard manner, which he apparently thought made him handsome.