password problem with rsync

[freebsd at critesclan.com]

Somewhere along the line, rsync quit using the --password-file=/file/with/pw
option. I have not used my script in months, and now it is not working. I
pulled out the part that does the rsync, and here it is:

------------------------------------------------------------
#!/usr/local/bin/bash

RSYNC_PROXY=873
passwordfile=/path/to/file/.password
RSYNC_PASSWORD=`cat $passwordfile`

echo "=-=-=-=-="
echo "[$RSYNC_PROXY] [$passwordfile] [$RSYNC_PASSWORD]"
echo "=-=-=-=-="

rsync \
  --password-file="$passwordfile" \
  --archive \
  --exclude="man" \
  --exclude="batchftp*" \
  --exclude="packages*" \
  --delete \
  --delete-excluded \
  --perms \
  --stats \
  --verbose \
  /source-dir-1 \
  /source-dir-2 \
  login at hostname:/target/dir
------------------------------------------------------------

The script works, except I continue to get the password prompt. I have tried
it:
* with/without "-e ssh",
* with/without /source-dir-2,
* as root and as myself,
* moving the "--password-file" line to the first, last, middle,
* both "--password-file=whatever" and "--password-file whatever" options,
* removing the "--password-file" so the "RSYNC_PASSWORD" env variable work,
as well as several other options.

It still asks me for the password.

I stay up-to-date with CVSup (tag=.), including the re-build/install, and
have kept the ports as current as possible. rsync is 2.5.6_1...

So was there some change in the port in the previous, say 9 months that
would have chance this behavior? I don't need the daemon running, so I don't
have the rsync.conf file set up -- but I didn't back when it was working.

Any clues?

Lee