diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 76c0ae26dc..284e49e094 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -26,6 +26,9 @@ Changes in version 0.2.1.10-alpha - 2009-01-??
     - Authorities now list vote for the Stable flag for any router whose
       weighted MTBF is at least 5 days, regardless of the mean MTBF.
     - Stop logging nameserver addresses in reverse order.
+    - If we are retrying something slowly over and over, do not
+      automatically give up after the 254th failure.  Bugfix on
+      0.2.1.9-alpha.
 
   o Code simplifications and refactoring:
     - Change our header file guard macros to be less likely to conflict
diff --git a/src/or/directory.c b/src/or/directory.c
index 68f438106b..ed2e859dc8 100644
--- a/src/or/directory.c
+++ b/src/or/directory.c
@@ -3341,7 +3341,7 @@ download_status_increment_failure(download_status_t *dls, int status_code,
   int increment;
   tor_assert(dls);
   if (status_code != 503 || server) {
-    if (dls->n_download_failures < IMPOSSIBLE_TO_DOWNLOAD)
+    if (dls->n_download_failures < IMPOSSIBLE_TO_DOWNLOAD-1)
       ++dls->n_download_failures;
   }