diff --git a/guile-readline/ChangeLog b/guile-readline/ChangeLog
index 40aa50545..69ae5f082 100644
--- a/guile-readline/ChangeLog
+++ b/guile-readline/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,9 @@
+2008-04-16  Ludovic Courtès  <ludo@gnu.org>
+
+	* configure.in (AC_INIT): Don't use "echo -n", which is not
+	available on MacOS X; use `patsubst' instead to remove the
+	newline.  Reported by Steven Wu <wus@qwest.net>.
+
 2008-02-16  Ludovic Courtès  <ludo@gnu.org>
 
 	* LIBGUILEREADLINE-VERSION
diff --git a/guile-readline/configure.in b/guile-readline/configure.in
index d0fda02a1..9098a31e6 100644
--- a/guile-readline/configure.in
+++ b/guile-readline/configure.in
@@ -1,7 +1,12 @@
 AC_PREREQ(2.50)
 
+dnl Don't use "echo -n", which is not portable (e.g., not available on
+dnl MacOS X).  Instead, use `patsubst' to remove the newline.
 AC_INIT(guile-readline,
-        m4_esyscmd(. ../GUILE-VERSION && echo -n ${GUILE_VERSION}))
+        patsubst(m4_esyscmd(. ../GUILE-VERSION && echo ${GUILE_VERSION}), [
+]),
+	[bug-guile@gnu.org])
+
 AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR([.])
 AC_CONFIG_SRCDIR(readline.c)
 AM_CONFIG_HEADER([guile-readline-config.h])