Sir Thomas Barrington, writing to his mother, captured the threatening atmosphere overhanging the end of Charles's third Parliament. No man knew what to do, he wrote, ‘the distraction was so sudden and so great …’ Barrington hinted at the possibility of bloodshed which he seems to have feared as the likely outcome of the events of 2 March. He concluded: ‘he whose heart bleeds not at the threat of these times is too stupid. I pray God send us better grounds of comfort, and with all to be armed for the worst that can befall us … ’ The imprisonment of those who had staged the demonstration in the House of Commons was part of Charles's response to what was, from a royal point of view, an extremely threatening situation. Contarini wrote on 6 March: