rpws commands run from terminal in ratpoison, but not from .ratpoisonrc?

Hello,

this command runs from xterm in ratpoison, but doesn't run if from ~/.ratpoisonrc:
ratpoison -c "exec rpws init 4; rpws 1; ratpoison -c "vsplit"; rpws 2; ratpoison -c "hsplit"" &

I want to do the frame setting as described by that command on startup of ratpoison.

Thanks in advance.