gnu emacs rmail question

[Lynda LoDestro <lodestro@llnl.gov>]

I have spent quite a while using emacs's help before resorting
to this posting. I apologize if I missed the solution.

I am on linux, running GNU Emacs 21.3.1

The question is about attachments in rmail---they arrive
embedded, like this:

---begin illustration of embedded message

------=_NextPart_001_003E_01C71874.E3F05580--

------=_NextPart_000_003D_01C71874.E3F05580
Content-Type: application/pdf;
	name="SPSEnewauthcard.pdf"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-Disposition: attachment;
	filename="SPSEnewauthcard.pdf"

JVBERi0xLjQNJeLjz9MNCjQgMCBvYmogPDwvTGluZWFyaXplZCAxL0wgNzcyNjQvTyA2L0UgNjA3
MDIvTiAxL1QgNzcxMzgvSCBbIDEzNTYgMjI1XT4+DWVuZG9iag0gICAgICAgICAgICAgICAgICAg
DQp4cmVmDQo0IDUzDQowMDAwMDAwMDE2IDAwMDAwIG4NCjAwMDAwMDE1ODEgMDAwMDAgbg0KMDAw
MDAwMTY3NiAwMDAwMCBuDQowMDAwMDAyMDgzIDAwMDAwIG4NCjAwMDAwMDIzODYgMDAwMDAgbg0K

---end illustration of embedded message

I tried extracting the region (starting with JV...) and applying
the emacs function base64-decod<tab> 
A lot was decoded correctly, but not all the \xxx characters were
correct. This was determined by diff'ing with correct version of the
pdf file.  acroread on the result was a failure (blank pages).

Do you have advice?

  Thank you,

   Lynda