diff --git a/perl/lib/Nix/Manifest.pm b/perl/lib/Nix/Manifest.pm
index 21c61d284f..9c891abb8b 100644
--- a/perl/lib/Nix/Manifest.pm
+++ b/perl/lib/Nix/Manifest.pm
@@ -53,8 +53,14 @@ sub addPatch {
 sub readManifest_ {
     my ($manifest, $addNAR, $addPatch) = @_;
 
-    open MANIFEST, "<$manifest"
-        or die "cannot open `$manifest': $!";
+    # Decompress the manifest if necessary.
+    if ($manifest =~ /\.bz2$/) {
+        open MANIFEST, "$Nix::Config::bzip2 -d < $manifest |"
+            or die "cannot decompress `$manifest': $!";
+    } else {
+        open MANIFEST, "<$manifest"
+            or die "cannot open `$manifest': $!";
+    }
 
     my $inside = 0;
     my $type;
diff --git a/scripts/nix-pull.in b/scripts/nix-pull.in
index f3cba0c026..d8352b2774 100755
--- a/scripts/nix-pull.in
+++ b/scripts/nix-pull.in
@@ -59,16 +59,7 @@ sub processURL {
     # First see if a bzipped manifest is available.
     if (system("$Nix::Config::curl --fail --silent --head '$url'.bz2 > /dev/null") == 0) {
         print "fetching list of Nix archives at `$url.bz2'...\n";
-        my $bzipped = downloadFile "$url.bz2";
-
-        $manifest = "$tmpDir/MANIFEST";
-
-        system("$Nix::Config::bzip2 -d < $bzipped > $manifest") == 0
-            or die "cannot decompress manifest";
-
-        $manifest = (`$Nix::Config::binDir/nix-store --add $manifest`
-                     or die "cannot copy $manifest to the store");
-        chomp $manifest;
+        $manifest = downloadFile "$url.bz2";
     }
 
     # Otherwise, just get the uncompressed manifest.