All 15 Uses of

abrupt
in
Jane Eyre

Bessie and Abbot having retreated, Mrs. Reed, impatient of my now frantic anguish and wild sobs, abruptly thrust me back and locked me in, without farther parley.†
p. 22.7

abruptly = suddenly and unexpectedly

"I will indeed send her to school soon," murmured Mrs. Reed sotto voce; and gathering up her work, she abruptly quitted the apartment.†
p. 45.4

"This will be your luggage, I suppose?" said the man rather abruptly when he saw me, pointing to my trunk in the passage.†
p. 112.4

I had scarce tied the strings of the portfolio, when, looking at his watch, he said abruptly "It is nine o'clock: what are you about, Miss Eyre, to let Adele sit up so long?†
p. 149.0

Continuing then to pursue his walk in silence, I ventured to recall him to the point whence he had abruptly diverged "Did you leave the balcony, sir," I asked, "when Mdlle.†
p. 168.0

"Good-night, my — " He stopped, bit his lip, and abruptly left me.
p. 210.9 *

abruptly = suddenly

Having spread the quilt and folded my night-dress, I went to the window-seat to put in order some picture-books and doll's house furniture scattered there; an abrupt command from Georgiana to let her playthings alone (for the tiny chairs and mirrors, the fairy plates and cups, were her property) stopped my proceedings; and then, for lack of other occupation, I fell to breathing on the frost-flowers with which the window was fretted, and thus clearing a space in the glass through which I might look out on the grounds, where all was still and petrified under the influence of a hard frost.†
p. 37.2

He lifted up the sable waves of hair which lay horizontally over his brow, and showed a solid enough mass of intellectual organs, but an abrupt deficiency where the suave sign of benevolence should have risen.†
p. 154.9

Then, in the first place, do you agree with me that I have a right to be a little masterful, abrupt, perhaps exacting, sometimes, on the grounds I stated, namely, that I am old enough to be your father, and that I have battled through a varied experience with many men of many nations, and roamed over half the globe, while you have lived quietly with one set of people in one house?†
p. 157.1

Mrs. Fairfax said she should not be surprised if he were to go straight from the Leas to London, and thence to the Continent, and not show his face again at Thornfield for a year to come; he had not unfrequently quitted it in a manner quite as abrupt and unexpected.†
p. 189.2

Eliza's greeting was delivered in a short, abrupt voice, without a smile; and then she sat down again, fixed her eyes on the fire, and seemed to forget me.†
p. 263.9

Mr. Rochester had sometimes read my unspoken thoughts with an acumen to me incomprehensible: in the present instance he took no notice of my abrupt vocal response; but he smiled at me with a certain smile he had of his own, and which he used but on rare occasions.†
p. 283.6

He almost started at my sudden and strange abruptness: he looked at me astonished.†
p. 428.6

I have been too abrupt in communicating the news; it has excited you beyond your strength.†
p. 445.9

Definitions:

(1) (abrupt as in: an abrupt change)
sudden and unexpected

or (less commonly): characterized by sudden changes or at a steep angle
(2) (abrupt as in: she is abrupt)
rude or unfriendly because of using too few words or moving too quickly