[gentoo-embedded] OT: Clock-Counter on an embedded board?

Hi List!

I know, this some kind of OT, but maybe someone here can help me out.

I am just wondering, if there is a possibility to use some sort of 
cpu-counter on an embedded board, running with linux 2.6.14?
I have a mips-architecture here and we want to figure out, which parts of 
our application need most of the time and cpu. That´s why we want to 
implement some kind of profiler, which should count the cpu-ticks.

Any help would be great!

thanks in advance!

Kind regards,
Andy