diff --git a/lib/puppet/interface/face_collection.rb b/lib/puppet/interface/face_collection.rb
index 6e6afc545..baa424692 100644
--- a/lib/puppet/interface/face_collection.rb
+++ b/lib/puppet/interface/face_collection.rb
@@ -1,143 +1,138 @@
 # -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
 require 'puppet/interface'
 
 module Puppet::Interface::FaceCollection
   SEMVER_VERSION = /^(\d+)\.(\d+)\.(\d+)([A-Za-z][0-9A-Za-z-]*|)$/
 
   @faces = Hash.new { |hash, key| hash[key] = {} }
 
   def self.faces
     unless @loaded
       @loaded = true
       $LOAD_PATH.each do |dir|
-        next unless FileTest.directory?(dir)
-        Dir.chdir(dir) do
-          Dir.glob("puppet/face/*.rb").collect { |f| f.sub(/\.rb/, '') }.each do |file|
-            iname = file.sub(/\.rb/, '')
-            begin
-              require iname
-            rescue Exception => detail
-              puts detail.backtrace if Puppet[:trace]
-              raise "Could not load #{iname} from #{dir}/#{file}: #{detail}"
-            end
-          end
-        end
+        Dir.glob("#{dir}/puppet/face/*.rb").
+          collect {|f| File.basename(f, '.rb') }.
+          each {|name| self[name, :current] }
       end
     end
-    return @faces.keys.select {|name| @faces[name].length > 0 }
+    @faces.keys.select {|name| @faces[name].length > 0 }
   end
 
   def self.validate_version(version)
     !!(SEMVER_VERSION =~ version.to_s)
   end
 
   def self.semver_to_array(v)
     parts = SEMVER_VERSION.match(v).to_a[1..4]
     parts[0..2] = parts[0..2].map { |e| e.to_i }
     parts
   end
 
   def self.cmp_semver(a, b)
     a, b = [a, b].map do |x| semver_to_array(x) end
 
     cmp = a[0..2] <=> b[0..2]
     if cmp == 0
       cmp = a[3] <=> b[3]
       cmp = +1 if a[3].empty? && !b[3].empty?
       cmp = -1 if b[3].empty? && !a[3].empty?
     end
     cmp
   end
 
   def self.prefix_match?(desired, target)
     # Can't meaningfully do a prefix match with current on either side.
     return false if desired == :current
     return false if target  == :current
 
     # REVISIT: Should probably fail if the matcher is not valid.
     prefix = desired.split('.').map {|x| x =~ /^\d+$/ and x.to_i }
     have   = semver_to_array(target)
 
     while want = prefix.shift do
       return false unless want == have.shift
     end
     return true
   end
 
   def self.[](name, version)
     name = underscorize(name)
     get_face(name, version) or load_face(name, version)
   end
 
   # get face from memory, without loading.
   def self.get_face(name, desired_version)
     return nil unless @faces.has_key? name
 
     return @faces[name][:current] if desired_version == :current
 
     found = @faces[name].keys.select {|v| prefix_match?(desired_version, v) }.sort.last
     return @faces[name][found]
   end
 
   # try to load the face, and return it.
   def self.load_face(name, version)
     # We always load the current version file; the common case is that we have
     # the expected version and any compatibility versions in the same file,
     # the default.  Which means that this is almost always the case.
     #
     # We use require to avoid executing the code multiple times, like any
     # other Ruby library that we might want to use.  --daniel 2011-04-06
     begin
       require "puppet/face/#{name}"
 
       # If we wanted :current, we need to index to find that; direct version
       # requests just work™ as they go. --daniel 2011-04-06
       if version == :current then
         # We need to find current out of this.  This is the largest version
         # number that doesn't have a dedicated on-disk file present; those
         # represent "experimental" versions of faces, which we don't fully
         # support yet.
         #
         # We walk the versions from highest to lowest and take the first version
         # that is not defined in an explicitly versioned file on disk as the
         # current version.
         #
         # This constrains us to only ship experimental versions with *one*
         # version in the file, not multiple, but given you can't reliably load
         # them except by side-effect when you ignore that rule this seems safe
         # enough...
         #
         # Given those constraints, and that we are not going to ship a versioned
         # interface that is not :current in this release, we are going to leave
         # these thoughts in place, and just punt on the actual versioning.
         #
         # When we upgrade the core to support multiple versions we can solve the
         # problems then; as lazy as possible.
         #
         # We do support multiple versions in the same file, though, so we sort
         # versions here and return the last item in that set.
         #
         # --daniel 2011-04-06
         latest_ver = @faces[name].keys.sort {|a, b| cmp_semver(a, b) }.last
         @faces[name][:current] = @faces[name][latest_ver]
       end
     rescue LoadError => e
       raise unless e.message =~ %r{-- puppet/face/#{name}$}
       # ...guess we didn't find the file; return a much better problem.
+    rescue SyntaxError => e
+      raise unless e.message =~ %r{puppet/face/#{name}\.rb:\d+: }
+      Puppet.err "Failed to load face #{name}:\n#{e}"
+      # ...but we just carry on after complaining.
     end
 
     return get_face(name, version)
   end
 
   def self.register(face)
     @faces[underscorize(face.name)][face.version] = face
   end
 
   def self.underscorize(name)
     unless name.to_s =~ /^[-_a-z]+$/i then
       raise ArgumentError, "#{name.inspect} (#{name.class}) is not a valid face name"
     end
 
     name.to_s.downcase.split(/[-_]/).join('_').to_sym
   end
 end
diff --git a/spec/fixtures/faulty_face/puppet/face/syntax.rb b/spec/fixtures/faulty_face/puppet/face/syntax.rb
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..3b1e36c3f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/spec/fixtures/faulty_face/puppet/face/syntax.rb
@@ -0,0 +1,8 @@
+Puppet::Face.define(:syntax, '1.0.0') do
+  action :foo do
+    when_invoked do |whom|
+      "hello, #{whom}"
+    end
+  # This 'end' is deliberately omitted, to induce a syntax error.
+  # Please don't fix that, as it is used for testing. --daniel 2011-05-02
+end
diff --git a/spec/unit/interface/face_collection_spec.rb b/spec/unit/interface/face_collection_spec.rb
index 4358ef4b6..4ad8787c5 100755
--- a/spec/unit/interface/face_collection_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/unit/interface/face_collection_spec.rb
@@ -1,163 +1,180 @@
 #!/usr/bin/env rspec
 require 'spec_helper'
 
 require 'tmpdir'
 require 'puppet/interface/face_collection'
 
 describe Puppet::Interface::FaceCollection do
   # To avoid cross-pollution we have to save and restore both the hash
   # containing all the interface data, and the array used by require.  Restoring
   # both means that we don't leak side-effects across the code. --daniel 2011-04-06
   #
   # Worse luck, we *also* need to flush $" of anything defining a face,
   # because otherwise we can cross-pollute from other test files and end up
   # with no faces loaded, but the require value set true. --daniel 2011-04-10
   before :each do
     @original_faces    = subject.instance_variable_get("@faces").dup
     @original_required = $".dup
     $".delete_if do |path| path =~ %r{/face/.*\.rb$} end
     subject.instance_variable_get(:@faces).clear
     subject.instance_variable_set(:@loaded, false)
   end
 
   after :each do
     subject.instance_variable_set(:@faces, @original_faces)
-    $".clear ; @original_required.each do |item| $" << item end
+    @original_required.each {|f| $".push f unless $".include? f }
   end
 
   describe "::prefix_match?" do
     #   want     have
     { ['1.0.0', '1.0.0'] => true,
       ['1.0',   '1.0.0'] => true,
       ['1',     '1.0.0'] => true,
       ['1.0.0', '1.1.0'] => false,
       ['1.0',   '1.1.0'] => false,
       ['1',     '1.1.0'] => true,
       ['1.0.1', '1.0.0'] => false,
     }.each do |data, result|
       it "should return #{result.inspect} for prefix_match?(#{data.join(', ')})" do
         subject.prefix_match?(*data).should == result
       end
     end
   end
 
   describe "::validate_version" do
     { '10.10.10'     => true,
       '1.2.3.4'      => false,
       '10.10.10beta' => true,
       '10.10'        => false,
       '123'          => false,
       'v1.1.1'       => false,
     }.each do |input, result|
       it "should#{result ? '' : ' not'} permit #{input.inspect}" do
         subject.validate_version(input).should(result ? be_true : be_false)
       end
     end
   end
 
   describe "::[]" do
     before :each do
       subject.instance_variable_get("@faces")[:foo]['0.0.1'] = 10
     end
 
     it "should return the face with the given name" do
       subject["foo", '0.0.1'].should == 10
     end
 
     it "should attempt to load the face if it isn't found" do
       subject.expects(:require).with('puppet/face/bar')
       subject["bar", '0.0.1']
     end
 
     it "should attempt to load the default face for the specified version :current" do
       subject.expects(:require).with('puppet/face/fozzie')
       subject['fozzie', :current]
     end
 
     it "should return true if the face specified is registered" do
       subject.instance_variable_get("@faces")[:foo]['0.0.1'] = 10
       subject["foo", '0.0.1'].should == 10
     end
 
     it "should attempt to require the face if it is not registered" do
       subject.expects(:require).with do |file|
         subject.instance_variable_get("@faces")[:bar]['0.0.1'] = true
         file == 'puppet/face/bar'
       end
       subject["bar", '0.0.1'].should be_true
     end
 
     it "should return false if the face is not registered" do
       subject.stubs(:require).returns(true)
       subject["bar", '0.0.1'].should be_false
     end
 
     it "should return false if the face file itself is missing" do
       subject.stubs(:require).
         raises(LoadError, 'no such file to load -- puppet/face/bar')
       subject["bar", '0.0.1'].should be_false
     end
 
     it "should register the version loaded by `:current` as `:current`" do
       subject.expects(:require).with do |file|
         subject.instance_variable_get("@faces")[:huzzah]['2.0.1'] = :huzzah_face
         file == 'puppet/face/huzzah'
       end
       subject["huzzah", :current]
       subject.instance_variable_get("@faces")[:huzzah][:current].should == :huzzah_face
     end
 
     context "with something on disk" do
       it "should register the version loaded from `puppet/face/{name}` as `:current`" do
         subject["huzzah", '2.0.1'].should be
         subject["huzzah", :current].should be
         Puppet::Face[:huzzah, '2.0.1'].should == Puppet::Face[:huzzah, :current]
       end
 
       it "should index :current when the code was pre-required" do
         subject.instance_variable_get("@faces")[:huzzah].should_not be_key :current
         require 'puppet/face/huzzah'
         subject[:huzzah, :current].should be_true
       end
     end
 
     it "should not cause an invalid face to be enumerated later" do
       subject[:there_is_no_face, :current].should be_false
       subject.faces.should_not include :there_is_no_face
     end
   end
 
   describe "::register" do
     it "should store the face by name" do
       face = Puppet::Face.new(:my_face, '0.0.1')
       subject.register(face)
       subject.instance_variable_get("@faces").should == {:my_face => {'0.0.1' => face}}
     end
   end
 
   describe "::underscorize" do
     faulty = [1, "#foo", "$bar", "sturm und drang", :"sturm und drang"]
     valid  = {
       "Foo"      => :foo,
       :Foo       => :foo,
       "foo_bar"  => :foo_bar,
       :foo_bar   => :foo_bar,
       "foo-bar"  => :foo_bar,
       :"foo-bar" => :foo_bar,
     }
 
     valid.each do |input, expect|
       it "should map #{input.inspect} to #{expect.inspect}" do
         result = subject.underscorize(input)
         result.should == expect
       end
     end
 
     faulty.each do |input|
       it "should fail when presented with #{input.inspect} (#{input.class})" do
         expect { subject.underscorize(input) }.
           should raise_error ArgumentError, /not a valid face name/
       end
     end
   end
+
+  context "faulty faces" do
+    before :each do
+      $:.unshift "#{PuppetSpec::FIXTURE_DIR}/faulty_face"
+    end
+
+    after :each do
+      $:.delete_if {|x| x == "#{PuppetSpec::FIXTURE_DIR}/faulty_face"}
+    end
+
+    it "should not die if a face has a syntax error" do
+      subject.faces.should be_include :help
+      subject.faces.should_not be_include :syntax
+      @logs.should_not be_empty
+      @logs.first.message.should =~ /syntax error/
+    end
+  end
 end