diff -uNr htdig-3.1.3.orig/htcommon/defaults.cc htdig-3.1.3/htcommon/defaults.cc
--- htdig-3.1.3.orig/htcommon/defaults.cc	Wed Sep 22 18:18:39 1999
+++ htdig-3.1.3/htcommon/defaults.cc	Tue Nov  2 15:28:38 1999
@@ -47,6 +47,7 @@
     {"doc_db",				"${database_base}.docdb"},
     {"doc_index",			"${database_base}.docs.index"},
     {"doc_list",			"${database_base}.docs"},
+    {"encoding",			""},
     {"end_ellipses",			"<b><tt> ...</tt></b>"},
     {"endings_affix_file",		"${common_dir}/english.aff"},
     {"endings_dictionary",		"${common_dir}/english.0"},
diff -uNr htdig-3.1.3.orig/htsearch/Display.cc htdig-3.1.3/htsearch/Display.cc
--- htdig-3.1.3.orig/htsearch/Display.cc	Wed Sep 22 18:18:44 1999
+++ htdig-3.1.3/htsearch/Display.cc	Tue Nov  2 15:42:51 1999
@@ -99,6 +99,7 @@
     if (number <= 0)
 	number = 10;
     int			startAt = (pageNumber - 1) * number;
+    char		*encoding = config["encoding"];
 
     if (config.Boolean("logging"))
     {
@@ -119,13 +120,19 @@
 	// No matches.
 	//
         delete matches;
-	cout << "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
+	if ( strcmp(encoding, "") == 0 )
+	    cout << "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
+	else
+	    cout << "Content-type: text/html; charset=" << encoding << "\r\n\r\n";
 	displayNomatch();
 	return;
     }
     // maxScore = match->getScore();	// now done in buildMatchList()
-    	
-    cout << "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
+
+    if ( strcmp(encoding, "") == 0 )
+	cout << "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
+    else
+	cout << "Content-type: text/html; charset=" << encoding << "\r\n\r\n";
     String	wrap_file = config["search_results_wrapper"];
     String	*wrapper = 0;
     char	*header = 0, *footer = 0;
@@ -597,7 +604,12 @@
 void
 Display::displaySyntaxError(char *message)
 {
-    cout << "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
+    char		*encoding = config["encoding"];
+
+    if ( strcmp(encoding, "") == 0 )
+	cout << "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
+    else
+	cout << "Content-type: text/html; charset=" << encoding << "\r\n\r\n";
 
     setVariables(0, 0);
     vars.Add("SYNTAXERROR", new String(message));
diff -uNr htdig-3.1.3.orig/installdir/htdig.conf htdig-3.1.3/installdir/htdig.conf
--- htdig-3.1.3.orig/installdir/htdig.conf	Wed Sep 22 18:18:47 1999
+++ htdig-3.1.3/installdir/htdig.conf	Tue Nov  2 15:27:06 1999
@@ -115,6 +115,12 @@
 # template_name: long
 
 #
+# The following parameter change encoding header field of HTTP response
+# generated by htsearch. If your search results are in ISO-8859-1 character
+# set, leave this uncommented.
+#encoding:	ISO-8859-1
+
+#
 # The following are used to change the text for the page index.
 # The defaults are just boring text numbers.  These images spice
 # up the result pages quite a bit.  (Feel free to do whatever, though)