>On one of my systems I have (in /etc/rc - it is a 1.4.1 system, predates
>the rc.d stuff) ...
>
>if checkyesno cron; then 
>        echo -n ' cron';                cron
>        ( while :
>        do
>                sleep 77 
>                if [ `ps axc | grep -i cron | wc -l` -lt 1 ]
>                then
>                        logger -p cron.notice -t CRON_RESTART "restarting cron"
>                        cron
>                fi
>        done & )
>fi
>echo '.' 

actually...to combat this problem (i saw it once or twice) i wrote a
cron job to check if cron was running, and if not to restart it.  it
runs once every five minutes.  if cron was dead, i get email and it
gets restarted.

    #!/bin/sh
    sleep 360
    read pid < /var/run/cron.pid
    if kill -0 $pid >/dev/null 2>&1; then
	    exit 0
    else
	    cron
	    echo cron was dead
    fi

-- 
|-----< "CODE WARRIOR" >-----|
codewarrior@daemon.org             * "ah!  i see you have the internet
twofsonet@graffiti.com (Andrew Brown)                that goes *ping*!"
andrew@crossbar.com       * "information is power -- share the wealth."