1.   Before the letter could contaminate him with reason he pushed it into the fire and watched it burn.

2.   No one knew that one unopened letter could contaminate another.

3.   Potter said postal authorities operated under the assumption that there was only a remote chance that the letters had contaminated the mail system.

4.   That letter contaminated postal workers, equipment and thousands of pieces of mail.

5.   There have been dozens of hoaxes since, including one here last October, when a letter purportedly contaminated with anthrax was sent to an abortion clinic.

6.   Authorities said it was possible that the Daschle letter contaminated other mail, which then infected this man.

7.   Both cases raised the possibility that anthrax letters are contaminating other mail or that the spores are sickening people by means other than the mail.