make sure distutils logging is shut off in tests to avoid spurious output
diff --git a/Lib/distutils/log.py b/Lib/distutils/log.py
index 024e7c2..bf26302 100644
--- a/Lib/distutils/log.py
+++ b/Lib/distutils/log.py
@@ -50,7 +50,10 @@
 fatal = _global_log.fatal
 
 def set_threshold(level):
+    # return the old threshold for use from tests
+    old = _global_log.threshold
     _global_log.threshold = level
+    return old
 
 def set_verbosity(v):
     if v <= 0: