bash-2.05b$ rm cvs.module
bash-2.05b$ cvs up -r DRUPAL-4-7--2 cvs.module
cvs update: warning: `cvs.module' was lost
U cvs.module
bash-2.05b$ patch -p0 < cvs-minor.patch 
Hmm...  Looks like a unified diff to me...
The text leading up to this was:
--------------------------
|Index: cvs.module
|===================================================================
|RCS file: /cvs/drupal-contrib/contributions/modules/cvslog/cvs.module,v
|retrieving revision 1.106.2.19.2.32
|diff -u -r1.106.2.19.2.32 cvs.module
|--- cvs.module 3 Dec 2006 01:56:05 -0000       1.106.2.19.2.32
|+++ cvs.module 3 Dec 2006 19:00:01 -0000
--------------------------
Patching file cvs.module using Plan A...
Hunk #1 failed at 1.
Hunk #2 failed at 528.
Hunk #3 failed at 1212.
Hunk #4 failed at 1267.
Hunk #5 failed at 1315.
Hunk #6 failed at 1336.
Hunk #7 failed at 1543.
Hunk #8 failed at 1575.
Hunk #9 failed at 1642.
Hunk #10 failed at 1666.
Hunk #11 failed at 1734.
Hunk #12 failed at 2058.
12 out of 12 hunks failed--saving rejects to cvs.module.rej
done