I think the reason you used hg status $WorkPath is because it limits the status to the current sub directory of a hg repository.
i.e.
Let's say project/ is a hg repo
cd project/ hg status # This shows status for everything under project/
cd project/subdir hg status project/subdir # This shows status for everything in subdir
Now...if this is GOOD or BAD behavior is up for discussion. Personally I like the former better, I usually want to see the status of all files in my repo.
What do you think?
Yi