MOVL    #QUEUE,R0         ;Get queue header
  10$:    MOVL    (R0),R0   ;Get entry from queue
          BEQL    20$       ;Forward branch assumed unlikely
          .
          .                 ;Process queue entry
          .
          TSTL    (R0)      ;More than one entry (known to be unlikely)
          .BRANCH_UNLIKELY
          BNEQ    10$       ;This branch made into forward
  20$:                      ;conditional branch

      The .BRANCH_UNLIKELY directive is used here because the Alpha
      hardware would predict a backward branch to 10$ as likely to be
      taken. The programmer knows it is a rare case, so the directive
      is used to change the branch to a forward branch, which is
      predicted not taken.