0.9.4: can't configure/compile on FreeBSD 2.2.7

[Claus Assmann]

I'm having a problem with the configuration/compilation of 0.9.4
on a FreeBSD 2.2.7 system. It relates to the configuration
variables:
ac_cv_sys_global_symbol_pipe
ac_cv_sys_symbol_underscore

This results in several errors (in mpi/ (linebreak inserted by me)):
gcc -g -O2 -Wall -Wcast-align -Wshadow -Wstrict-prototypes -o mpicalc mpicalc.o \
  ../cipher/libcipher.a ../util/libutil.a ../mpi/libmpi.a ../util/libutil.a -lc -lgdbm -lz
mpi-inline.h:117: Undefined symbol `_mpihelp_sub_n' referenced from text segment

The code in configure first tries to find a command to
filter the output of 'nm' and fails, since it looks like this:

    if egrep ' nm_test_var$' "$ac_nlist" >/dev/null; then
              ^

i.e. it looks for the name without leading underscore.
Later on this command is used to decide whether a leading underscore
is required, so it seems like a catch-22 to me. But I have
to admit that I don't know anything about GNU autoconf...

Is this a general problem or one with my FreeBSD version/installation?
Currently I hacked configure:
*** configure	Sat Mar 13 14:31:54 1999
--- configure.my	Sat Mar 13 14:25:07 1999
***************
*** 1848,1855 ****
      fi
  
      # Make sure that we snagged all the symbols we need.
!     if egrep ' nm_test_var$' "$ac_nlist" >/dev/null; then
!       if egrep ' nm_test_func$' "$ac_nlist" >/dev/null; then
          cat <<EOF > conftest.c
  #ifdef __cplusplus
  extern "C" {
--- 1848,1855 ----
      fi
  
      # Make sure that we snagged all the symbols we need.
!     if egrep '[ _]nm_test_var$' "$ac_nlist" >/dev/null; then
!       if egrep '[ _]nm_test_func$' "$ac_nlist" >/dev/null; then
          cat <<EOF > conftest.c
  #ifdef __cplusplus
  extern "C" {