diff -Nuard gnome-panel-2.4.1.orig/gnome-panel/panel-menu.c gnome-panel-2.4.1/gnome-panel/panel-menu.c
--- gnome-panel-2.4.1.orig/gnome-panel/panel-menu.c 1970-01-01 01:00:00.000000000 +0100
+++ gnome-panel-2.4.1/gnome-panel/panel-menu.c 2003-12-03 01:30:49.228495360 +0100
-@@ -0,0 +1,773 @@
+@@ -0,0 +1,778 @@
+/*
+ * To set this up insert something like this in your ~/.gtkrc-2.0
+ *
+ if (pm->side_image && widget->allocation.height < gdk_pixbuf_get_height (pm->side_image))
+ {
+ gint scaled_width = ((scaled_height * gdk_pixbuf_get_width (pm->side_image)) / gdk_pixbuf_get_height (pm->side_image));
++
++ if (pm->scaled_image)
++ gdk_pixbuf_unref(pm->scaled_image);
+
+ pm->scaled_image = gdk_pixbuf_scale_simple (pm->side_image,
+ scaled_width,
+ scaled_height,
+ GDK_INTERP_BILINEAR); /* maybe HYPER ? */
++ gdk_pixbuf_unref(pm->side_image);
++ pm->side_image = pm->scaled_image;
+ }
+ else
+ {