Initialize by throwing an exception?

[Eric Lemings]

 
tests/containers/23.vector.cons.cpp:
...
685 #ifndef _RWSTD_NO_EXCEPTIONS
686
687     try {
688         // throw an exception to initialize the lib (allocates
689         // memory that's never deallocated; shows up as leaks)
690         _RW::__rw_throw (_RWSTD_ERROR_LOGIC_ERROR, "", "");
691     }
692     catch (...) {
693     }
694
695 #endif   // _RWSTD_NO_EXCEPTIONS
...

This seems very odd.  Initializing the library by throwing an exception.
Or is this meant only to initialize the exception handling portions of
the library?

Was hoping someone could shed some light on this.

Brad.