How can I get text of the body (payload) of an email?

[andrew blah]

Hello,

I need to get the text of the body (the payload) of an email.

As I understand it, an email has headers at the top, then a blank line,
then the body of the message.

I want to get the text of the body - every character from the new line
after the headers until the end of the message.

My objective is to do an SHA hash on the body text so the get_payload
method isn't what I am after.

Can anyone suggest a convenient way to get access to the raw message
payload?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Andrew Stuart