can not parse a simple FIX message using simplefix

Question

I'm trying to parse a FIX message using Python simplefix:

import simplefix
parser = simplefix.FixParser()
parser.append_buffer("8=FIX.4.2|35=A|49=SENDER_COMP_ID|56=TARGET_COMP_ID|34=1|98=0|108=30|10=112|")
message = parser.get_message()

Alas - message is None. What am I doing wrong?