diff --git a/uiop/pathname.lisp b/uiop/pathname.lisp
index 74bf464d9d37db4220e2acb858d31716a0d6cece..05b44c48f966bebf3686500a820138a03e6ee697 100644
--- a/uiop/pathname.lisp
+++ b/uiop/pathname.lisp
@@ -302,13 +302,9 @@ ways that the filename components can be missing are for it to be NIL,
 Note that this does _not_ check to see that PATHNAME points to an
 actually-existing directory."
     (when pathname
-      #+allegro
-      (handler-case 
-       (excl:file-directory-p pathname)
-       ;; Allegro can be fussy about translating oddball pathnames
-       ;; to namestrings
-       (file-error () nil))
-      #-allegro
+      ;; I tried using Allegro's excl:file-directory-p, but this cannot be done,
+      ;; because it rejects apparently legal pathnames as
+      ;; ill-formed. [2014/02/10:rpg]
       (let ((pathname (pathname pathname)))
         (flet ((check-one (x)
                  (member x '(nil :unspecific "") :test 'equal)))