xterm won't start on AMD K6 with stock 2.6.22-1-486 kernel

[Paul Scott <waterhorse@ultrasw.com>]

Laptop with AMD K6 running Debian sid

xterm works w/ stock 2.6.17-2-486

with stock 2.6.22-1-486 attempting to start xterm gives:

xterm: Error 32, errno 2: No such file or directory
Reason: get_pty: not enough ptys

I have upgraded almost anything that needed it that would have come 
after the 2.6.17-2-486 kernels.  Any of that upgrading may have caused 
the xterm problem.

TIA for any more ideas.

Paul Scott