  We present a quantitative analysis of the abundances of heavy elements in
damped Ly-alpha galaxies in the sample of Lu et al. (1996). In particular, we
compare the observed gas-phase abundances with those expected when the
intrinsic (i.e., nucleosynthetic) pattern is the same as that in either the Sun
or in Galactic halo stars and when the depletion pattern is the same as that in
the warm Galactic interstellar medium, but with various values of the
dust-to-metals ratio. We find that the observations are equally consistent with
the solar and halo-star intrinsic patterns and that they favor some depletion,
the typical dust-to-metals ratio being 40%-90% of that in the Milky Way today.
However, neither intrinsic pattern matches the observations perfectly. For the
solar pattern, the discrepancy is mainly with [Mn/Fe], while for the halo-star
pattern, the discrepancy is with [Zn/Fe], [Ni/Fe], and possibly [Al/Fe]. Our
analysis does not support the claim by Lu et al. that the damped Ly-alpha
galaxies have halo-star abundance patterns and no dust depletion.
