Recovering from accidental debconf removal

[Douglas Bates <bates@stat.wisc.edu>]

I was trying to install a version of MySQL server 3.23 on a Debian 2.2
(potato) system by recompiling from the source package.  One of the
dependencies that the source package for Debian 2.3 introduces is on a
new version of debconf.  I tried compiling the new version of debconf
but ran into trouble installing it.  I then made the mistake of
removing the debconf package.

I am now in the situation where I cannot install either
debconf_0.2.80.16.deb or debconf-tiny_0.2.80.16.deb.  The error
messages look like

521# dpkg -i /var/tmp/debconf_0.2.80.16.deb 
(Reading database ... 64872 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to replace debconf 0.2.80.16 (using /var/tmp/debconf_0.2.80.16.deb) ...
Unpacking replacement debconf ...
Setting up debconf (0.2.80.16) ...
Can't locate object method "value" via package "Debconf::Question" at /usr/lib/perl5/Debian/DebConf/Config.pm line 76.
dpkg: error processing debconf (--install):
 subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 255
Errors were encountered while processing:
 debconf

I would appreciate any advice.  One of the packages that got removed
with debconf is cvs and this machine happens to be cvs.r-project.org
so I have a few people rather irritated with me.