Setting sort_buffer_size to a small enough number causes an assertion failure for a simple query with ORDER BY in MariaDB 5.3/5.5

This bug can be reproduced with the following test case:

CREATE TABLE t1(f0 int auto_increment primary key, f1 int, f2 varchar(200));
INSERT INTO t1(f1, f2) VALUES
(0,"0"),(1,"1"),(2,"2"),(3,"3"),(4,"4"),(5,"5"),
(6,"6"),(7,"7"),(8,"8"),(9,"9"),(10,"10"),
(11,"11"),(12,"12"),(13,"13"),(14,"14"),(15,"15"),
(16,"16"),(17,"17"),(18,"18"),(19,"19"),(20,"20"),
(21,"21"),(22,"22"),(23,"23"),(24,"24"),(25,"25"),
(26,"26"),(27,"27"),(28,"28"),(29,"29"),(30,"30"),
(31,"31"),(32,"32"),(33,"33"),(34,"34"),(35,"35"),
(36,"36"),(37,"37"),(38,"38"),(39,"39"),(40,"40"),
(41,"41"),(42,"42"),(43,"43"),(44,"44"),(45,"45"),
(46,"46"),(47,"47"),(48,"48"),(49,"49"),(50,"50"),
(51,"51"),(52,"52"),(53,"53"),(54,"54"),(55,"55"),
(56,"56"),(57,"57"),(58,"58"),(59,"59"),(60,"60"),
(61,"61"),(62,"62"),(63,"63"),(64,"64"),(65,"65"),
(66,"66"),(67,"67"),(68,"68"),(69,"69"),(70,"70"),
(71,"71"),(72,"72"),(73,"73"),(74,"74"),(75,"75"),
(76,"76"),(77,"77"),(78,"78"),(79,"79"),(80,"80"),
(81,"81"),(82,"82"),(83,"83"),(84,"84"),(85,"85"),
(86,"86"),(87,"87"),(88,"88"),(89,"89"),(90,"90"),
(91,"91"),(92,"92"),(93,"93"),(94,"94"),(95,"95"),
(96,"96"),(97,"97"),(98,"98"),(99,"99");
set session sort_buffer_size= 2000;
SELECT * FROM t1 ORDER BY f1 ASC, f0;

An execution of this test case leads to a failure of the assertion
DBUG_ASSERT(maxcount!=0) from the function merge_buffers in any debug version of 5.3/5.5.
In non-debug versions it causes a crash of the server.