The Winter's Tale play contains one of the most famous Shakespearean stage directions: "Exit, pursued by a bear", presaging the offstage death of Antigonus. It is not known whether Shakespeare used a real bear from the London bear-pits, or an actor in bear costume. The Royal Shakespeare Company, in one production of this play, used a large sheet of silk which moved and created shapes, to symbolise both the bear and the gale in which Antigonus is travelling. One comic moment in the play deals with a servant not realising that poetry featuring references to dildos is vulgar, presumably from not knowing what
Practice direction Practice direction In English law, a practice direction is a supplemental protocol to rules of civil and criminal procedure in the courts – "a device to regulate minor procedural matters". The Civil Procedure Rules 1998 contains a large number of practice directions which give practical advice on how to interpret the rules themselves. Also, individual courts and judges may make their own practice directions, especially in specialist types of proceedings such as in the patent court. A famous example of a Practice Statement occurred in 1966 when the House of Lords declared itself able to depart from its own precedent