I can't reproduce this error on head with Ubuntu Linux/amd64 gcc 4.1.2.  What are the platform details?  OS, compiler, etc.


$ gcc -pthread -fPIC -fno-strict-aliasing -DNDEBUG -g -O3 -Wall -I/usr/include -I/usr/local/include -I./Include -I. -c ../spam.cc -o spam.o
$ gcc -pthread -shared spam.o -L/usr/lib64 -L/usr/local/lib -Wl,-R/usr/lib64 -ldb-4.4 -o build/lib.linux-x86_64-2.6/spam.so -lstdc++
$ ./python
>>> import spam
>>> spam.system('ls')
this be cerr
big5.py               __db.003    libpython2.6.a   Objects        python-clean
build                 __db.004    LICENSE          Parser         python-fast
config.log            __db.005    log.0000000001   PC             README
config.status         Demo        Mac              PCbuild        RISCOS
config.status.lineno  Doc         Makefile         PCbuild8       setup.py
configure             Grammar     Makefile.pre     pyconfig.h     Tools
configure.in          Include     Makefile.pre.in  pyconfig.h.in
__db.001              install-sh  Misc             python
__db.002              Lib         Modules          Python
0