Folks--
For some reason I'm not getting the emails I send, even though I've properly set the bit in the list software. Ah, well.
Jamesb on #lisp solved the problem. Apparently, you need to set the profile path for some sites, or the embedded gecko widget tanks. The profile path is the place the browser saves all the cookie/login information.
I've updated the code I linked to earlier in case anyone wants to play with it. Personally, I think CFFI made this all pretty easy, though kudos to the mozilla team for the library in the first place.
Thankfully, this really wasn't a CFFI problem.
BTW, using glade made GTK pretty painless. I just had to define the procedures I needed. I can see how, over time, a GTK interface (CLOS based) might get implemented, but with libglade, I almost think, why bother?
Now, if I could just integrate slime/swank into GtkSourceView....
Keith