Okay... I downloaded the 1.2.1 boot floppy images, and made disks of them.
This time, I got to where it figured out kernel sizes, entry points, or
whatever, and asked me to insert the system floppy. When I whack the return
key to tell it to go ahead, the system reboots without even a brief floppy
access.

>From this, I suspect that Martin Husemann's suggestion that my monochrome
graphics card is unsupported is correct. So, I'll see if I can find some
sort of newer graphics card somewhere... Booting from a disk that's set up
with a console compiled to use a serial kernel isn't an option for me yet,
since I don't have the right cabling to let the 486 talk to anything yet.

Just out of curiosity, do any older NetBSD releases support MGA? Is there
any way that MGA support could be compiled into a kernel? There must be
*some* other folks out there using decrepit video hardware...

Thanks in advance for the further information, and thanks for the help I've
already received!

--
        Mason Loring Bliss    /\    mason@acheron.middleboro.ma.us
     www.webtrek.com/mason   /()\   awake ? sleep() : dream();
<barbaric>YAWP!</barbaric>  /    \  Squeak to me of love!