Hi Nathan, >quux is a function taking a (pointer to function taking no args, returning a Foo) argument and returning a Bar I realize that's what the compiler is interpreting it as. But I believe that the compiler's interpretation of the code is incorrect. MSVC (that bastion of standards compliance -- NOT!), and CodeWarrior interpret the code as the variable quux using the const Foo& constructor of Bar. I don't have the EDG compiler at my disposal, and my Comeau C++ compiler is from 1990 (*grin*). --Eljay