diff -ur gnuplot-3.7.1.orig/term/fig.trm gnuplot-3.7.1/term/fig.trm
--- gnuplot-3.7.1.orig/term/fig.trm	Sun Aug 22 19:52:28 1999
+++ gnuplot-3.7.1/term/fig.trm	Fri Apr  7 22:07:08 2000
@@ -614,15 +614,24 @@
 unsigned int x, y;
 char *str;
 {
+    int has_latex_command = 0;
+
     if (strlen(str) == 0)
 	return;
     FIG_poly_clean(FIG_polyvec_stat);
     y -= term->v_char / 2;	/* assuming vertical center justified */
+    /*
+     * gnuplot used to create SPECIAL_TEXT for all text strings, but this
+     * is only really needed if str contains LaTeX commands. we assume that
+     * a string contains LaTeX commands if it contains a backslash.
+     */
+    if (strchr(str,'\\'))
+	has_latex_command = SPECIAL_TEXT;
 
     fprintf(gpoutfile, "%d %d %d %d %d %d %6.3f %6.3f %d %6.3f %6.3f %d %d %s\\001\n",
 	    OBJ_TEXT, FIG_justify, FIG_color, 0, FIG_DEFAULT,
 	    FIG_ROMAN_FONT, (float) FIG_font_s,
-	    FIG_angle, SPECIAL_TEXT, (float) term->v_char,
+	    FIG_angle, has_latex_command, (float) term->v_char,
 	    (float) term->h_char * strlen(str),
 	    FIG_xoff + x, term->ymax + FIG_yoff - y, str);
 }