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Basic Analysis IV
Basic Analysis IV: Measure Theory and Integration

The giant squids are interested in advanced mathematical


training and Jim is happy to help!

James K. Peterson
Department of Mathematical Sciences
Clemson University
First edition published 2021
by CRC Press
6000 Broken Sound Parkway NW, Suite 300, Boca Raton, FL 33487-2742

and by CRC Press


2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN

© 2020 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

CRC Press is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group

Reasonable efforts have been made to publish reliable data and information, but the author and publisher cannot as­
sume responsibility for the validity of all materials or the consequences of their use. The authors and publishers have
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tification and explanation without intent to infringe.

ISBN: 978-1-138-05511-7 (hbk)


ISBN: 978-1-315-16618-6 (ebk)
LCCN: 2019059882
Dedication We dedicate this work to all of our students who have been learning these ideas of
analysis through our courses. We have learned as much from them as we hope they have from us. We
are a firm believer that all our students are capable of excellence and that the only path to excellence
is through discipline and study. We have always been proud of our students for doing so well on this
journey. We hope these notes in turn make you proud of our efforts.

Abstract This book introduces graduate students in mathematics concepts from measure theory
and also, continues their training in the abstract way of looking at the world. We feel that is a most
important skill to have when your life’s work will involve quantitative modeling to gain insight into
the real world.

Acknowledgments I want to acknowledge the great debt I have to my wife, Pauli, for her pa­
tience in dealing with the long hours spent in typing and thinking. You are the love of my life.

The cover for this book is an original painting by me done in July 2017. It shows the moment when
the giant squids reached out to me to learn advanced mathematics.
Table of Contents

I Introductory Matter 1
1 Introduction 3
1.1 The Analysis Courses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1.1 Senior Level Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.1.2 The Graduate Analysis Courses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.1.3 More Advanced Courses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.2 Teaching the Measure and Integration Course . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.3 Table of Contents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
1.4 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

II Classical Riemann Integration 13


2 An Overview of Riemann Integration 15
2.1 Integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.1.1 The Riemann Integral as a Limit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.1.2 The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.1.3 The Cauchy Fundamental Theorem of Calculus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
2.2 Handling Jumps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.2.1 Removable Discontinuity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.2.2 Jump Discontinuity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

3 Bounded Variation 29
3.1 Partitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
3.2 Monotone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
3.2.1 The Saltus Function . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3.2.2 The Continuous Part of a Monotone Function . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
3.3 Bounded Variation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.4 The Total Variation Function . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
3.5 Continuous Functions of Bounded Variation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

4 Riemann Integration 55
4.1 Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
4.2 Existence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
4.3 Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
4.4 Riemann Integrable? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
4.5 More Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
4.6 Fundamental Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
4.7 Substitution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
4.8 Same Integral? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

vii
viii TABLE OF CONTENTS

5 Further Riemann Results 93


5.1 Limit Interchange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
5.2 Riemann Integrable? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
5.3 Content Zero . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

III Riemann - Stieltjes Integration 109


6 The Riemann - Stieltjes Integral 111
6.1 Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
6.2 Step Integrators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
6.3 Monotone Integrators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
6.4 Equivalence Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
6.5 Further Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
6.6 Bounded Variation Integrators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

7 Further Riemann - Stieltjes Results 133


7.1 Fundamental Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
7.2 Existence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
7.3 Computations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

IV Abstract Measure Theory One 147


8 Measurability 149
8.1 Borel Sigma-Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
8.2 The Extended Borel Sigma-Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
8.3 Measurable Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
8.3.1 Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
8.4 Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
8.5 Extended Real-Valued . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
8.6 Extended Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
8.7 Continuous Compositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
8.7.1 The Composition with Finite Measurable Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
8.7.2 The Approximation of Non-Negative Measurable Functions . . . . . . . . 168
8.7.3 Continuous Functions of Extended Real-Valued Measurable Functions . . 170

9 Abstract Integration 173


9.1 Measures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
9.2 Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
9.3 Sequences of Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
9.4 Integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
9.5 Integration Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
9.6 Equality a.e. Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
9.7 Complete Measures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
9.8 Convergence Theorems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
9.8.1 Monotone Convergence Theorems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
9.8.2 Fatou’s Lemma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
9.9 The Absolute Continuity of a Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
9.10 Summable Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
9.11 Extended Integrands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
9.12 Levi’s Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
TABLE OF CONTENTS ix

9.13 Constructing Charges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207


9.14 Properties of Summable Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
9.15 The Dominated Convergence Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
9.16 Alternative Abstract Integration Schemes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
9.16.1 Properties of the Darboux Integral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218

10 The Lp Spaces 223


10.1 The General Lp Spaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
10.2 The World of Counting Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
10.3 Essentially Bounded Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
10.4 The Hilbert Space L2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247

V Constructing Measures 249


11 Building Measures 251
11.1 Measures from Outer Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
11.2 The Properties of the Outer Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
11.3 Measures Induced by Outer Measures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
11.4 Measures from Metric Outer Measures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
11.5 Constructing Outer Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264

12 Lebesgue Measure 273


12.1 Outer Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
12.2 Lebesgue Outer Measure is a Metric Outer Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
12.3 Lebesgue Measure is Regular . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
12.4 Approximation Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288
12.4.1 Approximating Measurable Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288
12.4.2 Approximating Measurable Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
12.5 The Summable Functions are Separable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
12.6 The Existence of Non-Lebesgue Measurable Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
12.7 Metric Spaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297

13 Cantor Sets 301


13.1 Generalized . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
13.2 Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
13.3 The Cantor Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
13.4 Consequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307

14 Lebesgue - Stieltjes Measure 309


14.1 Lebesgue - Stieltjes Outer Measure and Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311
14.2 Approximation Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
14.3 Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318

VI Abstract Measure Theory Two 323


15 Convergence Modes 325
15.1 Extracting Subsequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
15.2 Egoroff’s Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
15.3 Vitali’s Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
15.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344
x TABLE OF CONTENTS

16 Decomposing Measures 349


16.1 Jordan Decomposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
16.2 Hahn Decomposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354
16.3 Variation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
16.4 Absolute Continuity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359
16.5 Radon-Nikodym . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362
16.6 Lebesgue Decomposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 370

17 Connections to Riemann Integration 375

18 Fubini Type Results 379


18.1 The Riemann Setting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
18.1.1 Fubini on a Rectangle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 380
18.2 The Lebesgue Setting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387

19 Differentiation 397
19.1 Absolutely Continuous Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
19.2 LS and AC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 398
19.3 Bounded Variation Derivatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401
19.4 Measure Estimates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 404
19.5 Extending the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 408
19.6 Charges Induced by Absolutely Continuous Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414

VII Summing It All Up 417


20 Summing It All Up 419

VIII References 423

IX Detailed Index 427

X Appendix: Undergraduate Analysis Background Check 443


A Undergraduate Analysis Part One 445
A-1 Sample Exams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448
A-1.1 Exam 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448
A-1.2 Exam 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 449
A-1.3 Exam 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 450
A-1.4 Final . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 451

B Undergraduate Analysis Part Two 453


B-1 Sample Exams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
B-1.1 Exam 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
B-1.2 Exam 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 458
B-1.3 Exam 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
B-1.4 Final . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 460
TABLE OF CONTENTS xi

XI Appendix: Linear Analysis Background Check 463


C Linear Analysis 465
C-1 Sample Exams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
C-1.1 Exam 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
C-1.2 Exam 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 468
C-1.3 Exam 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
C-1.4 Final . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470

XII Appendix: Preliminary Examination Check 475


D The Preliminary Examination in Analysis 477
D-1 Sample Exams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477
D-1.1 Exam 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477
D-1.2 Exam 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 479
D-1.3 Exam 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481
D-1.4 Exam 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 482
D-1.5 Exam 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 483
D-1.6 Exam 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 484
D-1.7 Exam 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 485
D-1.8 Exam 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487
Part I

Introductory Matter

1
Chapter 1

Introduction

We believe that all students who are seriously interested in mathematics at the master’s and doctoral
level should have a passion for analysis even if it is not the primary focus of their own research
interests. So you should all understand that my own passion for the subject will shine though in the
notes that follow! And, it goes without saying that we assume that you are all mature mathematically
and eager and interested in the material! Now, the present text focuses on the topics of Measure and
Integration from a very abstract point of view, but it is very helpful to place this course into its proper
context. Also, for those of you who are preparing to take the qualifying examination in analysis, the
overview below will help you see why all this material fits together into a very interesting web of
ideas.

1.1 The Analysis Courses


In outline form, the classical material on analysis would cover the material using textbooks equivalent
to the ones listed below:

(A): Undergraduate Analysis, text Advanced Calculus: An Introduction to Analysis, by Watson


Fulks. Our take on this material can be seen in (Peterson (8) 2020). Additional material, not
covered in courses now but very useful is discussed in (Peterson (10) 2020).

(B): Introduction to Abstract Spaces, text Introduction to Functional Analysis and Applications,
by Ervin Kreyszig. Our take on this material is seen in (Peterson (9) 2020).

(C): Measure Theory and Abstract Integration, texts General Theory of Functions and Integra­
tion, by Angus Taylor and Real Analysis, by Royden are classics but actually very hard to
read and absorb. Our take on this material is the text you are currently reading.

(D:) Topology and Functional Analysis. A classical text is Topology and Analysis by Simmons.
Our take on this material, and other topics, is seen in (Peterson (6) 2020).

In addition, a nice book that organizes the many interesting examples and counterexamples in this
area is good to have on your shelf. We recommend the text Counterexamples in Analysis by Gel­
baum and Olmstead. There are thus essentially five courses required to teach you enough of the
concepts of mathematical analysis to enable you to read technical literature (such as engineering,
control, physics, mathematics, statistics and so forth) at the beginning research level. Here are some
more details about these courses.

3
4 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

1.1.1 Senior Level Analysis


Typically, this is a full two semester sequence that discusses thoroughly what we would call the
analysis of functions of a real variable. This two semester sequence covers the following:

Advanced Calculus I: This course studies sequences and functions whose domain is simply the
real line. There are, of course, many complicated ideas, but everything we do here involves
things that act on real numbers to produce real numbers. If we call these things that act on
other things, OPERATORS, we see that this course is really about real-valued operators on
real numbers. This course invests a lot of time in learning how to be precise with the notion of
convergence of sequences of objects, that happen to be real numbers, to other numbers.

1. Basic Logic, Inequalities for Real Numbers, Functions


2. Sequences of Real Numbers, Convergence of Sequences
3. Subsequences and the Bolzano - Weierstrass Theorem
4. Cauchy sequences
5. Continuity of Functions
6. Consequences of Continuity
7. Uniform Continuity
8. Differentiability of Functions
9. Consequences of Differentiability
10. Taylor Series Approximations

Advanced Calculus II: In this course, we rapidly become more abstract. First, we develop carefully
the concept of the Riemann Integral. We show that although differentiation is intellectually
quite a different type of limit process, it is intimately connected with the Riemann integral.
Also, for the first time, we begin to explore the idea that we could have sequences of objects
other than real numbers. We study carefully their convergence properties. We learn about
two fundamental concepts: pointwise and uniform convergence of sequences of objects called
functions. We are beginning to see the need to think about sets of objects, such as functions,
and how to define the notions of convergence and so forth in this setting.

1. The Riemann Integral


2. Sequences of Functions
3. Uniform Convergence of Sequence of Functions
4. Series of Functions

Our version of this course, (Peterson (8) 2020) adds two variable calculus, convex analysis in � and
a nice discussion of Fourier Series. It turns out many of our mathematics majors do not take an
advanced engineering mathematics class, so they are not necessarily exposed to Fourier Series tools.
And there is a lot of nice mathematics in that!

1.1.2 The Graduate Analysis Courses


There are three basic courses at most universities. First, linear analysis, then measure and integration
and finally, functional analysis. Linear analysis is a core analysis course and all master’s students
usually take it. Also, linear analysis and measure theory and integration form the two courses which
we test prospective Ph.D. students on as part of the analysis preliminary examination. The content of
these courses, also must fit within a web of other responsibilities. Many students are typically weak
INTRODUCTION 5

in abstraction coming in, so if we teach the material too fast, we lose them. Now if 20 students take
linear analysis, usually 15 or 75% are already committed to an master’s program which emphasizes
Operations Research, Statistics, Algebra/ Combinatorics or Computation in addition to applied Anal­
ysis. Hence, currently, there are only about 5 students in linear analysis who might be interested in
an master’s specialization in analysis. The other students typically either don’t like analysis at all and
are only there because they have to be or they like analysis but it is part of their studies in number
theory, partial differential equations for the computation area, and so forth. Either way, the students
will not continue to study analysis for a degree specialization. However, we think it is important for
all students to both know and appreciate this material. Traditionally, there are several ways to go.

The Cynical Approach: Nothing you can do will make students who don’t like analysis change their
mind. So teach the material hard and fast and target the 2 - 3 students who can benefit. The rest
will come along for the ride and leave the course convinced that analysis is just like they thought –
too hard and too complicated. If you do this approach, you can pick about any book you like. Most
books for our students are too abstract and so are very hard for them to read. But the 2 -3 students
who can benefit from material at this level, will be happy with the book. We admit this is not our
style although some think it is a good way to find the really bright analysis students. We prefer the
alternate Enthusiastic “maybe I can get them interested anyway” Approach: The instructor scours
the available literature in order to make up notes to lead the students “gently” into the required
abstract way of thinking. We haven’t had much luck finding a published book for this, so since
this is our preferred plan of action: we have worked on notes such as the ones you have in your
hand for a long time. These notes start out handwritten and slowly mature into the typed versions.
Many students have suffered with the earlier versions and we thank them for that! We believe it
is important to actively try to get all the students interested but, of course, this is never completely
successful. However, we still think there is great value in this approach and it is the one we have
been trying for many years.

Introductory Linear Analysis: Our constraints here are to choose content so the students are ade­
quately exposed to a more abstract way of thinking about the world. We generally cover

• Metric Spaces.
• Vector Spaces with a Norm.
• Vector Spaces with an Inner Product.
• Linear Operators.
• Basic Linear Functional Analysis such as Hahn - Banach Theorems and so forth.
• The Baire Category, the Open Mapping and Closed Graph Theorems.

It doesn’t sound like much but there is a lot of material in here the students haven’t seen. For
example, we typically focus a lot on how we are really talking about sets of objects with some
additional structure. A set plus a way to measure distance between objects gives a metric space;
if we can add and scale objects, we get a vector space; if we have a vector space and add the
structure that allows us to project a vector to a subspace, we get an inner product space. We
also mention we could have a set of objects and define one operation to obtain a group or if we
define a special collection of sets we call open, we get a topological space and so forth. If we
work hard, we can help open their minds to the fact that each of the many sub-disciplines in the
Mathematical Sciences focuses on special structure we add to a set to help us solve problems
in that arena.
There are lots of ways to cover the important material in these topic areas and even many ways
to decide on exactly what is important from metric, normed and inner product spaces. So there
is that kind of freedom, but not so much freedom that you can decide to drop say, inner product
6 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

spaces. For example, we could use Sturm ¨ - Liouville systems as an example when the discus­
sion turns to eigenvalues of operators. It is nice to use projection theorems in an inner product
setting as a big finishing application, but remember the students are weak in background, e.g.
their knowledge of ordinary differential equations and Calculus in �n is normally weak. So
we are limited in our coverage of the completeness of an orthonormal sequence in an inner
product space in many respects. In fact, since the students don’t know measure theory (which
is in this text) the discussion of Hilbert spaces of functions is inherently weak. However, we
decided to address this by constructing the reals from scratch and then showing how to build a
set of functions L2 ([a, b]) which is a Hilbert space without having to resort to measure theory.
Of course, this is all equivalent to what you would get with a measure theory approach, but
it has the advantage of allowing the students to see how all the details work without brushing
stuff under the rug, so to speak! However, we can now develop this material in another way
using the ideas from measure theory which is the content of the present text. Also, if you look
carefully at that material, you need to cover some elementary versions of the Hahn - Banach
theorem to do it right which is why we have placed it the linear analysis course. In general, in
the class situation, we run out of time to cover such advanced topics. The trade-off seems to
be between thorough coverage of a small number of topics or rapid coverage of many topics
superficially. However, we can do it all in a book treatment and we have designed all of the
basic analysis books for self-study too.

We believe this course is a very critical one in the evolution of the student’s ability to think
abstractly and so teaching there is great value in teaching very, very carefully the basics of
this material. This course takes a huge amount of time for lecture preparation and student
interaction in the office, so when we teach this material, we slow down in our research output!
In more detail, in this text, we begin to rephrase all of our knowledge about convergence of
sequence of objects in a much more general setting.

1. Metric Spaces: A set of objects and a way of measuring distance between objects which
satisfies certain special properties. This function is called a metric and its properties
were chosen to mimic the properties that the absolute value function has on the real line.
We learn to understand convergence of objects in a general metric space. It is really
important to note that there is NO additional structure imposed on this set of objects; no
linear structure (i.e. vector space structure), no notion of a special set of elements called
a basis which we can use to represent arbitrary elements of the set. The metric in a sense
generalizes the notion of distance between numbers. We can’t really measure the size of
an object by itself, so we do not yet have a way of generalizing the idea of size or length.
A fundamentally important concept now emerges: the notion of completeness and how it
is related to our choice of metric on a set of objects. We learn a clever way of constructing
an abstract representation of the completion of any metric space, but at this time, we have
no practical way of seeing this representation.
2. Normed Spaces: We add linear structure to the set of objects and a way of measuring
the magnitude of an object; that is, there is now an operation we think of as addition
and another operation which allows us to scale objects and a special function called a
norm whose value for a given object can be thought of as the object’s magnitude. We
then develop what we mean by convergence in this setting. Since we have a vector space
structure, we can now begin to talk about a special subset of objects called a basis which
can be used to find a useful way of representing an arbitrary object in the space.
Another most important concept now emerges: the cardinality of this basis may be finite
or infinite. We begin to explore the consequences of a space being finite versus infinite
dimensional.
INTRODUCTION 7

3. Inner Product Spaces: To a set of objects with vector space structure, we add a function
called an inner product which generalizes the notion of dot product of vectors. This has
the extremely important consequence of allowing the inner product of two objects to be
zero even though the objects are not the same. Hence, we can develop an abstract notion
of the orthogonality of two objects. This leads to the idea of a basis for the set of objects
in which all the elements are mutually orthogonal. We then finally can learn how to build
representations of arbitrary objects efficiently.
4. Completions: We learn how to complete an arbitrary metric, normed or inner product
space in an abstract way, but we know very little about the practical representations of
such completions.
5. Linear Operators: We study a little about functions whose domain is one set of objects
and whose range is another. These functions are typically called operators. We learn a
little about them here.
6. Linear Functionals: We begin to learn the special role that real-valued functions acting
on objects play in analysis. These types of functions are called linear functionals and
learning how to characterize them is the first step in learning how to use them. We just
barely begin to learn about this here.

We have implemented this approach in (Peterson (9) 2020).

Measure Theory: This course generalizes the notion of integration to a very abstract setting. The
set of notes you are reading is a textbook for this material. Roughly speaking, we first realize
that the Riemann integral is a linear mapping from the space of bounded real-valued functions
on a compact interval into the reals which has a number of interesting properties. We then
study how we can generalize such mappings so that they can be applied to arbitrary sets X, a
special collection of subsets of X called a sigma-algebra and a new type of mapping called a
measure which on � generalizes our usual notion of the length of an interval. In this class, we
discuss the following:

1. The Riemann Integral.


2. Measures on a sigma-algebra S in the set X and integration with respect to the measure.
3. Measures specialized to sigma-algebras on the set �n and integrations with respect to
these measures. The canonical example of this is Lebesgue measure on �n .
4. Differentiation and integration in these abstract settings and their connections.

This is what we cover in the notes you are reading now and some other things!

1.1.3 More Advanced Courses


It is also recommended that students consider taking a course in what is called Functional Analy­
sis. Our version is (Peterson (6) 2020) which tries hard to put topology, analysis and algebra ideas
together into one pot. It is carefully designed for self-study as this course is just not being offered
as much as it should be. While not part of the qualifying examination, in this course, we can finally
develop in a careful way the necessary tools to work with linear operators, weak convergence and so
forth. This is a huge area of mathematics, so there are many possible ways to design an introductory
course. A typical such course would cover:

1. An Introduction to General Operator Theory.

2. Topological Vector Spaces and Distributions.


8 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

3. An Introduction to the Spectral Theory of Linear Operators; this is the study of the eigenvalues
and eigenobjects for a given linear operator; there are lots of applications here!

4. Differential Geometry ideas.

5. Degree Theory ideas.

6. Some advanced topics using these ideas: possibilities include

(a) Existence Theory of Boundary Value Problems.


(b) Existence Theory for Integral Equations.
(c) Existence Theory in Control.

1.2 Teaching the Measure and Integration Course


So now that you have seen how the analysis courses all fit together, it is time for the main course. So
roll up your sleeves and prepare to work! Let’s start with a few more details on what this course on
Measure and Integration will cover.

In this course, we assume mathematical maturity and we tend to follow The Enthusiastic “maybe
I can get them interested anyway” Approach in lecturing (so, be warned)! It is difficult to decide
where to start in this course. There is usually a reasonable fraction of you who have never seen an
adequate treatment of Riemann Integration. For example, not everyone may have seen the equivalent
of the second part of undergraduate analysis where Riemann integration is carefully discussed. We
therefore have taught several versions of this course and we have divide the material into blocks as
follows: We believe there are a lot of advantages in treating integration abstractly. So, if we covered
the Lebesgue integral on � right away, we can take advantage of a lot of the special structure � has
which we don’t have in general. It is better for long-term intellectual development to see measure
and integration approached without using such special structure. Also, all of the standard theorems
we want to do are just as easy to prove in the abstract setting, so why specialize to �? So we tend to
do abstract measure stuff first. The core material for Block 1 is as follows:

1. Abstract measure ν on a sigma-algebra S of subsets of a universe X.

2. Measurable functions with respect to a measure ν; these are also called random variables when
ν is a probability measure.

3. Integration f dν.

4. Convergence results: monotone convergence theorem, dominated convergence theorem, etc.

Then we develop the Lebesgue Integral in �n via outer measures as the great example of a nontrivial
measure. So Block 2 of material is thus:

1. Outer measures in �n .

2. Caratheodory conditions for measurable sets.

3. Construction of the Lebesgue sigma-algebra.

4. Connections to Borel sets.

To fill out the course, we pick topics from the following:


INTRODUCTION 9

1. Riemann and Riemann - Stieltjes integration. This would go before Block 1 if we do it. Call it
block Riemann.
2. Decomposition of measures – I love this material so this is after Block 2. Call it block Decom­
position.
3. Connection to Riemann integration via absolute continuity of functions. This is actually hard
stuff and takes about 3 weeks to cover nicely. Call it Block Riemann and Lebesgue. If this
is done without Block Riemann, you have to do a quick review of Riemann stuff so they can
follow the proofs.
4. Fubini type theorems. This would go after Block 2. Call this Block Fubini.
5. Differentiation via the Vitali approach. This is pretty hard too. Call this Differentiation.
6. Treatment of the usual Lp spaces. Call this Block Lp .
7. More convergence stuff like convergence in measure, Lp convergence implies convergence of
a subsequence pointwise, etc. These are hard theorems and to do them right requires a lot of
time. Call this More Convergence.

We have taught this in at least the following ways. And always, lots of homework and projects, as
we believe only hands-on work really makes this stuff sink in.

Way 1: Block Riemann, Block 1, Block 2 and Block Decomposition.


Way 2: Block 1, Block 2, Block Decomposition and Block Riemann and Lebesgue.
Way 3: Block 1, Block 2, Block Decomposition and Differentiation.
Way 4: Block 1, Block 2, Block Lp , Block More Convergence and Block Decomposition.
Way 5: Block 1, Block 2, Block Fubini, Block More Convergence and Block Decomposition.

In book form, we can cover all of these topics in some detail; not as much as we like, but enough to
get you started on your lifelong journey into these areas.

We use Octave (Eaton et al. (3) 2020), which is an open source GPL licensed (Free Software Foun­
dation (4) 2020) clone of MATLAB� R
, as a computational engine and we are not afraid to use it as
an adjunct to all the theory we go over. Of course, you can use MATLAB� R
(MATLAB (5) 2018 ­
2020) also if your university or workplace has a site license or if you have a personal license. Get
used to it: theory, computation and science go hand in hand! Well, buckle up and let’s get started!

1.3 Table of Contents


This text is based on quite a few years of teaching graduate courses in analysis and began from hand­
written notes starting roughly in the late 1990’s but with material being added all the time. Along
the way, these notes have been helped by the students we have taught and also by our own research
interests as research informs teaching and teaching informs research in return.

In this text, we go over the following blocks of material.

Part One: These are our beginning remarks you are reading now which are in Chapter 1.
Part Two: Classical Riemann Integration Here we are concerned with classic Riemann integra­
tion and the new class of functions called functions of bounded variation.
10 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

• In Chapter 2, we provide a quick overview of Riemann Integration just to set the stage.
• Chapter 3 discusses a new topic: functions of bounded variation.
• In Chapter 4, we carefully go over the basics of the theory of Riemann integration. We
want you to see how these proofs are done, so that is easy to see how they are modified
for the case of Riemann - Stieltjes integration.
• Chapter 5 goes over further important details of classical Riemann integration theory.
Part Three: Riemann - Stieltjes Integration We extend Riemann integration to Riemann - Stielt­
jes integration.
• Chapter 6 provides the basics of Riemann - Stieltjes integration theory.
• In Chapter 7, we add further details about Riemann - Stieltjes integrals.
Part Four: Abstract Measure Theory One We define what a measure is and then develop a corre­
sponding theory of integration based on this measure.
• Chapter 8 defines measures and their associated spaces. We do not know how to construct
measures yet, but we can work out many of the consequences of a measure if we assume
it is there to use.
• Chapter 9 develops the theory of integration based on a measure.
• In Chapter 10, we generalize the discussion of the gp sequence spaces to the more general
setting of equivalence classes of functions whose pth power is integrable in this more
general sense.
Part Five: Constructing Measures We learn how to construct measures in various ways.
• Chapter 11 discusses how to build or construct measures in very general ways.
• In Chapter 12, we carefully construct what is called Lebesgue measure.
• Chapter 13 shows you how to build specialized subsets of the real line called Cantor sets
which are the source of many examples and ideas. This chapter is a series of exercises
which as you finish them, you see how these sets are constructed via limiting processes
and what their properties are.
• In Chapter 14, we extend the construction of Lebesgue measures to Lebesgue - Stieltjes
measures.
Part Six: Abstract Measure Theory Two We want to finish with general comments on a variety
of topics: the different kinds of convergence of sequences of functions we now have, the way
measures can be decomposed into fundamental modes, how the Lebesgue integral connects to
the Riemann Integral, generalized Fubini results and finally some thoughts on differentiation
in this context. This last part allows us to state and prove an extension of the Fundamental
Theorem of Calculus.
• In Chapter 15, we discuss carefully the many types of convergence of sequences of func­
tions we have in this context.
• Chapter 16 explains how we can write measures as sums of simpler parts giving us a
variety of decomposition theorems.
• In Chapter 17, we develop connections between Lebesgue and Riemann Integration.
• Chapter 18 looks at the idea of multidimensional abstract integration in terms of iterated
integrals: i.e. extensions of the classical Fubini Theorems.
• Chapter 19 develops the idea of absolutely continuous functions and measures which we
use to extend the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus.
INTRODUCTION 11

Part Seven: Summing It All Up In Chapter 20, we talk about the things you have learned here and
where you should go next to continue learning more analysis.

There is much more we could have done, but these topics are a nice introduction into the further use
of abstraction in your way of thinking about models and should prepare you well for the next step,
which is functional analysis and topology.

1.4 Acknowledgments
I have been steadily shrinking since 1996 and currently I can only be seen when standing on a large
box. This has forced me to alter my lecture style somewhat so that my students can see me and I
am considering the use of platform shoes. However, if I can ever remember the code to my orbiting
spaceship, I will be able to access the shape changing facilities on board and solve the problem per­
manently. However, at the moment, I do what I can with this handicap.

There were many problems with the handwritten version of these notes, but with the help of my many
students in this class over the years, they have gotten better. However, being written in my handwrit­
ing was not a good thing. In fact, one student some years ago was so unhappy with the handwritten
notes, that he sent me the names of four engineering professors who actually typed their class notes
nicely. He told me I could learn from them how to be a better teacher. Well, it has taken me awhile,
but at least the notes are now typed. The teaching part, though, is another matter.

I will leave you with an easy proposition to prove; consider it your first mathematical test!
Proposition 1.4.1 My Proposition

My proposition is this: chocolate makes one happier!

Proof 1.4.1
Eat a piece of chocolate and the proof is there! �

And, of course, there is a corollary involving donuts which I will leave to you!

Jim Peterson
School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences
Clemson University
Part II

Classical Riemann Integration

13
Chapter 2

An Overview of Riemann Integration

In this chapter, we will give you a quick overview of Riemann integration. There are few real proofs
but it is useful to have a quick tour before we get on with the job of extending this material to a more
abstract setting.

2.1 Integration
There are two intellectually separate ideas here:
1. The idea of a Primitive or Antiderivative of a function f . This is any function F which is
differentiable and satisfies F ' (t) = f (t) at all points in the domain of f . Normally, the domain
of f is a finite interval of the form [a, b], although it could also be an infinite interval like all of
� or [1, ∞) and so on. Note that an antiderivative does not require any understanding of the
process of Riemann integration at all – only what differentiation is!
2. The idea of the Riemann integral of a function. You should have been exposed to this in your
first Calculus course and perhaps a bit more rigorously in your undergraduate second semester
analysis course.
Let’s review what Riemann Integration involves. First, we start with a bounded function f on a finite
interval [a, b]. This kind of function f need not be continuous! Then select a finite number of points
from the interval [a, b], {x0 , x1 , , . . . , xn−1 , xn }. We don’t know how many points there are, so a
different selection from the interval would possibly give us more or less points. But for convenience,
we will just call the last point xn and the first point x0 . These points are not arbitrary – x0 is always
a, xn is always b and they are ordered like this:

x0 = a < x1 < x2 < ... < xn−1 < xn = b

The collection of points from the interval [a, b] is called a Partition of [a, b] and is denoted by some
letter – here we will use the letter π. So if we say π is a partition of [a, b], we know it will have
n + 1 points in it, they will be labeled from x0 to xn , and they will be ordered left to right with
strict inequalities. But, we will not know what value the positive integer n actually is. The simplest
Partition π is the two point partition {a, b}. Note these things also:
1. Each partition of n + 1 points determines n subintervals of [a, b].
2. The lengths of these subintervals always add up to the length of [a, b] itself, b − a.
3. These subintervals can be represented as

{[x0 , x1 ], [x1 , x2 ], . . . , [xn−1 , xn ]}

15
16 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

or more abstractly as [xi , xi+1 ] where the index i ranges from 0 to n − 1.

4. The length of each subinterval is xi+1 − xi for the indices i in the range 0 to n − 1.

Now from each subinterval [xi , xi+1 ] determined by the Partition π, select any point you want and
call it si . This will give us the points s0 from [x0 , x1 ], s1 from [x1 , x2 ] and so on up to the last
point, sn−1 from [xn−1 , xn ]. At each of these points, we can evaluate the function f to get the value
f (sj ). Call these points an Evaluation Set for the partition π. Let’s denote such an evaluation set
by the letter σ. Note there are many such evaluation sets that can be chosen from a given partition
π. We will leave it up to you to remember that when we use the symbol σ, you must remember it is
associated with some partition.

If the function f was nice enough to be positive always and continuous, then the product f (si ) ×
(xi+1 − xi ) can be interpreted as the area of a rectangle. Then, if we add up all these rectangle areas
we get a sum which is useful enough to be given a special name: the Riemann sum for the function
f associated with the Partition π and our choice of evaluation set σ = {s0 , . . . , sn−1 }. This sum
is represented by the symbol S(f, π, σ) where the things inside the parentheses are there to remind
us that this sum depends on our choice of the function f , the partition π and the evaluations set σ.
Definition 2.1.1 Riemann Sum

The Riemann sum for the bounded function f , the partition π and the evaluation set σ =
{s0 , . . . , sn−1 } from π{x0 , x1 , , . . . , xn−1 , xn } is defined by
n−1

S(f, π, σ) = f (si ) (xi+1 − xi )
i=0

It is pretty misleading to write the Riemann sum this way as it can make us think that the n
is always the same when in fact it can change value each time we select a different partition
π. So many of us write the definition this way instead
� �
S(f, π, σ) = f (si ) (xi+1 − xi ) = f (si ) (xi+1 − xi )
i∈π π

and we just remember that the choice of π will determine the size of n.

Homework

Exercise 2.1.1 Let f (t) = 2t2 + 5 and let P = {0.0, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0} be a partition of the interval
[0.0, 2.0]. Let E = {0.5, 1.3, 1.8} be the evaluation set. Calculate S(f, P, E) and draw the picture
that represents this Riemann sum.
Exercise 2.1.2 Let f (t) = | cos(2t)| and let P = {−1.0, 2.0, 2.5, 5.0} be a partition of the interval
[−1.0, 5.0]. Let E = {1.5, 2.3, 3.9} be the evaluation set. Calculate S(f, P, E) and draw the picture
that represents this Riemann sum.
Exercise 2.1.3 Let f (t) = 4t2 + 2 on the interval [1, 3] with P = {1, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, 3.0} and E =
{1.2, 1.8, 2.3, 2.8}. Do this one in MATLAB.
Exercise 2.1.4 Let f (t) = t2 + 13t + 2 on the interval [1, 3] with P = {1, 1.6, 2.3, 2.8, 3.0} and
E = {1.2, 1.9, 2.5, 2.85}. Do this one in MATLAB.
Exercise 2.1.5 Let f (t) = 3t2 + 2t4 on the interval [1, 2] with P = {1, 1.2, 1.5, 1.8, 2.0} and E =
{1.1, 1.3, 1.7, 1.9}. Do this one in MATLAB.
AN OVERVIEW OF RIEMANN INTEGRATION 17

2.1.1 The Riemann Integral as a Limit


We can construct many different Riemann sums for a given function f . To define the Riemann
Integral of f , we only need a few more things:

1. Each partition π has a maximum subinterval length – let’s use the symbol || π || to denote this
length. We read the symbol || π || as the norm or gauge of π.

2. Each partition π and evaluation set σ determines the number S(f, π, σ) by a simple calcula­
tion.

3. So if we took a collection of partitions π1 , π2 and so on with associated evaluation sets σ1 ,


σ2 , etc., we would construct a sequence of real numbers {S(f, π1 , σ1 ), S(f, π2 , σ2 ), . . . , ,
S(f, πn , σn ), . . . , }. Let’s assume the norm of the partition πn gets smaller all the time; i.e.
limn → ∞ || πn ||= 0. We could then ask if this sequence of numbers converges to something.

What if the sequence of Riemann sums we construct above converged to the same number I no matter
what sequence of partitions whose norm goes to zero and associated evaluation sets we chose?
Then, we would have that the value of this limit is independent of the choices above. This is indeed
what we mean by the Riemann Integral of f on the interval [a, b].

Definition 2.1.2 Riemann Integrability of a Bounded Function

Let f be a bounded function on the finite interval [a, b]. if there is a number I so that

lim S(f, πn , σn ) = I
n→∞

no matter what sequence of partitions {πn } with associated sequence of evaluation sets
{σn } we choose as long as limn → ∞ || πn || = 0, we will say that the Riemann Integral
of f on [a, b] exists and equals the value I.

The value I is dependent on the choice of f and interval [a, b]. So we often denote this value by
I(f, [a, b]) or more simply as I(f, a, b). Historically, the idea of the Riemann integral was developed
using area approximation as an application, so the summing nature of the Riemann sum was denoted
by the 16th century letter S which resembled an elongated or stretched letter S which looked like
what we call the integral sign . Hence, the common notation for the Riemann Integral of f on [a, b],
b
when this value exists, is a f . We usually want to remember what the independent variable of f is
also and we want to remind ourselves that this value is obtained as we let the norm of the partitions
go to zero. The symbol dx for the independent variable x is used as a reminder that xi+1 − xi
is going to zero as the norm of the partitions goes to zero. So it has been very convenient to add
b b
to the symbol a f this information and use the augmented symbol a f (x) dx instead. Hence, if
b
the independent variable was t instead of x, we would use a f (t) dt. Since for a function f , the
name we give to the independent variable is a matter of personal choice, we see that the choice of
b
variable name we use in the symbol a f (t) dt is very arbitrary. Hence, it is common to refer to the
b
independent variable we use in the symbol a f (t) dt as the dummy variable of integration.
We need a few more facts. We shall prove later the following things are true about the Riemann
Integral of a bounded function. First, we know when a bounded function actually has a Riemann
integral.
Theorem Existence of the Riemann Integral
18 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

Let f be a bounded function on the finite interval [a, b]. Then the Riemann integral of f on
b
[a, b], a f (t)dt exists if

1. f is continuous on [a, b]

2. f is continuous except at a finite number of points on [a, b].

Further, if f and g are both Riemann integrable on [a, b] and they match at all but a finite
b b
number of points, then their Riemann integrals match; i.e. a f (t)dt equals a g(t)dt.

Most of the functions we want to work with do have a lot of smoothness, i.e. continuity and even
differentiability on the intervals we are interested in. Hence, the existence theorem will apply. Here
are some examples:

4
1. If f (t) is t2 on the interval [−2, 4], then −2
f (t)dt does exist as f is continuous on this
interval.

2. If g was defined by

t2 −2 ≤ t < 1 and 1 < t ≤ 4


g(t) =
5 t = 1

we see g is not continuous at only one point and so it is Riemann integrable on [−2, 4]. More­
over, since f and g are both integrable and match at all but one point, their Riemann integrals
are equal.

However, with that said, in this course, we want to relax the smoothness requirements on the func­
tions f we work with and define a more general type of integral for this less restricted class of
functions.

In Riemann integration, we subdivide the domain of f which is assumed to be a finite interval


into pieces which are disjoint except at the endpoints where they touch, pick a function value in
each of these pieces and compute the Riemann sum. We could do this a different way. We could
slice the range of f into disjoint values ci and look at the inverse image sets f −1 (ci ). If we had a
way of measuring the size of the sets f −1 (ci ), a different type of approximation would be the sum
ci µ(f −1 (ci )) where µ is a function which assigns a positive number to the set f −1 (ci ). If the
w
original
w subdivision gave us the sets Ei = [ti , ti+1 ], then the corresponding Riemann sum would be
f (si )µ([ti , ti+1 ]) where µ([ti , ti+1 ]) = ti+1 − ti is our usual way of defining the lengths of a
finite interval. However the inverse image f −1 (c) for a real number c does have to be a simple finite
interval. So this new way of slicing up the range immediately hits a snag. We need to figure out a
way to assign a non-negative number to arbitrary subsets of real numbers. This is not so easy to do,
and this entire text is about how to go about doing that.

Homework

Exercise 2.1.6 If f is RI on [−1, 4] and g is RI on [−1, 4], prove linear combinations of f and g are
also RI on [−1, 4].
Exercise 2.1.7 Prove the constant function f (x) is RI for any finite interval [a, b] and compute its
value.
AN OVERVIEW OF RIEMANN INTEGRATION 19

2.1.2 The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus

There is a big connection between the idea of the antiderivative of a function f and its Riemann
integral. For a positive function f on the finite interval [a, b], we can construct the area under the
x
curve function F (x) = a f (t) dt where for convenience we choose an x in the open interval (a, b).
We show F (x) and F (x + h) for a small positive h in Figure 2.1. Let’s look at the difference in
these areas:
x+h x
F (x + h) − F (x) = f (t) dt − f (t) dt
a a
x x+h x
= f (t) dt + f (t) dt − f (t) dt
a x a
x+h
= f (t) dt
x

where we have used standard properties of the Riemann integral to write the first integral as two
pieces and then do a subtraction. Now divide this difference by the change in x which is h. We find
x+h
F (x + h) − F (x) 1
= f (t) dt (2.1)
h h x

x+h
The difference in area, x
f (t) dt, is the second shaded area in Figure 2.1. Clearly, we have
x+h
F (x + h) − F (x) = f (t) dt (2.2)
x

We know that f is bounded on [a, b]; hence, there is a number B so that f (t) ≤ B for all t in [a, b].
Thus, using Equation 2.2, we see
x+h
0 ≤ F (x + h) − F (x) ≤ B dt = B h (2.3)
x

From this we have

0 ≤ lim (F (x + h) − F (x)) ≤ lim B h


h→0 h→0
= 0

We conclude that F is continuous at each x in [a, b] as

lim (F (x + h) − F (x)) = 0
h→0

It seems that the new function F we construct by integrating the function f in this manner, always
builds a new function that is continuous. Is F differentiable at x? If f is continuous at x, then given
a positive E, there is a positive δ so that

f (x) − E < f (t) < f (x) + E if x − δ < t < x + δ

and t is in [a, b]. So, if h is less than δ, we have


x+h x+h x+h
1 F (x + h) − F (x) 1 1
(f (x) − E) < = f (t) dt < (f (x) + E)
h x h h x h x
20 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

This is easily evaluated to give


x+h
F (x + h) − F (x)
f (x) − E < = f (t) dt < f (x) + E
h x

if h is less than δ. This shows that


F (x + h) − F (x)
lim = f (x)
h → 0+ h
You should be able to believe that a similar argument would work for negative values of h: i.e.,

F (x + h) − F (x)
lim− = f (x)
h→0 h
This tells us that F ' (x) exists and equals f (x) as long as f is continuous at x as

F (x + h) − F (x)
F ' (x+ ) = lim = f (x)
h → 0+ h
F (x + h) − F (x)
F ' (x− ) = lim = f (x)
h → 0− h
This relationship is called the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. The same sort of argument
works for x equals a or b, but we only need to look at the derivative from one side. We will prove
this sort of theorem using fairly relaxed assumptions on f for the interval [a, b] in the later chapters.
Even if we just consider the world of Riemann Integration, we only need to assume that f is Riemann
Integrable on [a, b], which allows for jumps in the function.

Theorem Fundamental Theorem of Calculus

Let f be Riemann Integrable on [a, b]. Then the function F defined on [a, b] by F (x) =
x
a
f (t) dt satisfies

1. F is continuous on all of [a, b]

2. F is differentiable at each point x in [a, b] where f is continuous and F ' (x) = f (x).

Using the same f as before, suppose G was defined on [a, b] as follows


b
G(x) = f (t) dt
x

Note that
x b
F (x) + G(x) = f (t) dt + f (t) dt
a x
b
= f (t) dt
a

b
Since the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus tells us F is differentiable, we see G(x) = a
f (t)dt −
F (x) must also be differentiable. It follows that

G' (x) = − F ' (x) = −f (x)


AN OVERVIEW OF RIEMANN INTEGRATION 21

A generic curve f on the


interval [a, b] which is
always positive. We let
F (x) be the area under this
(b, f (b)) curve from a to x. This
is indicated by the shaded
(a, f (a))
region.

F (x) F (x + h)

x x + h
a b

Figure 2.1: The function F (x).

Let’s state this as a variant of the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus, the Reversed Fundamental
Theorem of Calculus so to speak.
Theorem Fundamental Theorem of Calculus Reversed

Let f be Riemann Integrable on [a, b]. Then the function F defined on [a, b] by F (x) =
b
x
f (t) dt satisfies

1. F is continuous on all of [a, b]


2. F is differentiable at each point x in [a, b] where f is continuous and F ' (x) =
−f (x).

Homework

Exercise 2.1.8 Prove f is in RI([0, 1]) where f is defined by

x sin(1/x), x ∈ (0, 1]
f (x) =
0, x=0

Exercise 2.1.9 Let f : �2 → � be continuous on [0, 2] × [−10, 10]. Define F by F (t) =


t
−10
f (s, x(s))ds for any x ∈ C([−10, 10]). Is F continuous on [−10, 10]?
Exercise 2.1.10 Consider the differential equation x' = 3x with x(0) = 2. If x is a differentiable
function on [0, T ] which satisfies this differentiable equation, it is clear x' must be continuous and
22 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

t
x(t) = 0
3x(s)ds.

Exercise 2.1.11 Let f : �2 → � be continuous on [0, 2] × [−10, 10]. Consider a differentiable func­
tion x on [−10, 10] defined by x' (t) = f (t, x(t)). Note this forces x to have a continuous derivative.
t
Let T : C([−10, 10]) → C 1 ([−10, 10]) be defined by (T (x))(t) = x(−10) + 0 f (s, x(s))ds. Show
the existence of a solution to this differential equation to showing there is a fixed point to the operator
equation x = T (x). Make sure you understand proving such a fixed point exists is not easy. This is
one of things we do in a standard course on the theory of differential equations.

2.1.3 The Cauchy Fundamental Theorem of Calculus


We can use the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus to learn how to evaluate many Riemann integrals.
Let G be an antiderivative of the function f on [a, b]. Then, by definition, G' (x) = f (x) and so we
know G is continuous at each x. But we still don’t know that f itself is continuous. However, if we
assume f is continuous, then if we define F on [a, b] by
x
F (x) = f (a) + f (t) dt
a

the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus is applicable. Thus, F ' (x) = f (x) at each point. But that
means F ' = G' = f at each point. Functions whose derivatives are the same must differ by a
constant. Call this constant C. We thus have F (x) = G(x) + C. So, we have
b
F (b) = f (a) + f (t)dt = G(b) + C
a
a
F (a) = f (a) + f (t)dt = G(a) + C
a

a
But a
f (t) dt is zero, so we conclude after some rewriting
b
G(b) = f (a) + f (t)dt + C
a
G(a) = f (a) + C

And after subtracting, we find the important result


b
G(b) − G(a) = f (t)dt
a

This is what tells us how to integrate many functions. For example, if f (t) = t3 , we can guess
the antiderivatives have the form t4 /4 + C for an arbitrary constant C. Thus, since f (t) = t3 is
continuous, the result above applies. We can therefore calculate Riemann integrals of polynomials,
combinations of trigonometric functions and so forth. Let’s formalize this as a theorem called the
Cauchy Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. All we really need to prove this result is that f is
Riemann integrable on [a, b], which is true if our function f is continuous.

Theorem Cauchy Fundamental Theorem of Calculus

Let G be any antiderivative of the Riemann integrable function f on the interval [a, b].
b
Then G(b) − G(a) = a f (t) dt.
AN OVERVIEW OF RIEMANN INTEGRATION 23

The common symbol for the antiderivative of f has evolved to be f because of the close con­
nection between the antiderivative of f and the Riemann integral of f which is given in the Cauchy
b
Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. The usual Riemann integral, a f (t) dt of f on [a, b] computes
b
a definite value – hence, the symbol a f (t) dt is usually referred to as the definite integral of f
on [a, b] to contrast it with the family of functions represented by the antiderivative f . Since the
antiderivatives are arbitrary up to a constant, most of us refer to the antiderivative as the indefinite
integral of f . Also, we hardly ever say “let’s find the antiderivative of f ” – instead, we just say, “let’s
integrate f ”. We will begin using this shorthand now!

Homework

Exercise 2.1.12 The idea of an antiderivative is intellectually distinct from the Riemann integral of a
bounded function f . Let

x2 sin(1/x2 ), � 0, x ∈ [−1, 1]
x=
f (x) =
0, x=0

• Prove this function has a removable discontinuity at 0.

• Prove f is even differentiable on [−1, 1] with derivative

2x sin(1/x2 ) − (2/x) cos(1/x2 ), � 0, x ∈ [−1, 1]


x=
f ' (x) =
0, x=0

• Prove f ' is not bounded on [−1, 1] and hence it cannot be Riemann Integrable.

• Now connect this to the idea of antiderivatives, by letting g be defined by

2x sin(1/x2 ) − (2/x) cos(1/x2 ), � 0, x ∈ [−1, 1]


x=
g(x) =
0, x=0

Note g is f ' .

Define G by

x2 sin(1/x2 ), � 0, x ∈ [−1, 1]
x=
G(x) =
0, x=0

Prove G is the antiderivative of g even though g itself does not have a Riemann integral.

Again, the point is that the idea of the antiderivative of a function is intellectually distinct from that
of being Riemann integrable.
Exercise 2.1.13 Repeat the arguments of the previous exercise for the bounded function f . Let

3x2 sin(5/x2 ), x =
� 0, x ∈ [−1, 1]
f (x) =
0, x=0

Exercise 2.1.14 The fundamental theorem of calculus is often the only antiderivative we have. Il­
lustrate this point by looking at the antiderivatives of the functions hab infinitely differentiable bump
functions we defined in (Peterson (8) 2020).
24 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

2.2 The Riemann Integral of Functions with Jumps


Now let’s look at the Riemann integral of functions which have points of discontinuity.

2.2.1 Removable Discontinuity


Consider the function f defined on [−2, 5] by

⎨ 2t −2 ≤ t < 0
f (t) = 1 t = 0
(1/5)t2 0 < t ≤ 5

t
Let’s calculate F (t) = −2
f (s) ds. This will have to be done in several parts because of the way
f is defined.

1. On the interval [−2, 0], note that f is continuous except at one point, t = 0. Hence, f
is Riemann integrable by the existence theorem. Also, the function 2t is continuous on this
interval and so is also Riemann integrable. Then since f on [−2, 0] and 2t match at all but one
point on [−2, 0], their Riemann integrals must match. Hence, if t is in [−2, 0], we compute F
as follows:
t
F (t) = f (s) ds
−2
t
= 2s ds
−2
[t
2[
[
= s [
−2
= t2 − (−2)2 = t2 − 4

2. On the interval [0, 5], note that f is continuous except at one point, t = 0. Hence, f is
Riemann integrable. Also, the function (1/5)t2 is continuous on this interval and is therefore
also Riemann integrable. Then since f on [0, 5] and (1/5)t2 match at all but one point on [0, 5],
their Riemann integrals must match. Hence, if t is in [0, 5], we compute F as follows:
t
F (t) = f (s) ds
−2
0 t
= f (s) ds + f (s) ds
−2 0
0 t
= 2s ds + (1/5)s2 ds
−2 0
[0
[ [t
2[ 3[
[
= s [ + (1/15)s [
−2 0
= −4 + t3 /15

Thus, we have found that

t2 − 4 −2 ≤ t < 0
F (t) =
t3 /15 − 4 0 < t ≤ 5
AN OVERVIEW OF RIEMANN INTEGRATION 25

Note, we didn’t define F at t = 0 yet. Since f is Riemann Integrable on [−2, 5], we know from the
Fundamental Theorem of Calculus that F must be continuous. Let’s check. F is clearly continuous
on either side of 0 and we note that limt → 0− F (t) which is F (0− ) is −4 which is exactly the value
of F (0+ ). Hence, F is indeed continuous at 0 and we can write

t2 − 4 −2 ≤ t ≤ 0
F (t) =
t3 /15 − 4 0 ≤ t ≤ 5

What about the differentiability of F ? The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus guarantees that F has
a derivative at each point where f is continuous and at those points F ' (t) = f (t). Hence, we know
this is true at all t except 0. Note at those t, we find

2t −2 ≤ t < 0
F ' (t) =
(1/5)t2 0 < t ≤ 5

which is exactly what we expect. Also, note F ' (0− ) = 0 and F ' (0+ ) = 0 as well. Hence, since the
right- and left-hand derivatives match, we see F ' (0) does exist and has the value 0. But this is not
the same as f (0) = 1. Note, F is not the antiderivative of f on [−2, 5] because of this mismatch.

2.2.2 Jump Discontinuity


Now consider the function f defined on [−2, 5] by

⎨ 2t −2 ≤ t < 0
f (t) = 1 t = 0
2 + (1/5)t2 0 < t ≤ 5

t
Let’s calculate F (t) = −2
f (s) ds. Again, this will have to be done in several parts because of
the way f is defined.

1. On the interval [−2, 0], note that f is continuous except at one point, t = 0. Hence, f is
Riemann integrable. Also, the function 2t is continuous on this interval and hence is also
Riemann integrable. Then since f on [−2, 0] and 2t match at all but one point on [−2, 0], their
Riemann integrals must match. Hence, if t is in [−2, 0], we compute F as follows:
t
F (t) = f (s) ds
−2
t
= 2s ds
−2
[t
2[
[
= s [
−2
= t2 − (−2)2 = t2 − 4

2. On the interval [0, 5], note that f is continuous except at one point, t = 0. Hence, f is Riemann
integrable. Also, the function 2 + (1/5)t2 is continuous on this interval and so is also Riemann
integrable. Then since f on [0, 5] and 2 + (1/5)t2 match at all but one point on [0, 5], their
Riemann integrals must match. Hence, if t is in [0, 5], we compute F as follows:
t
F (t) = f (s) ds
−2
26 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

0 t
= f (s) ds + f (s) ds
−2 0
0 t
= 2s ds + (2 + (1/5)s2 ) ds
−2 0
[0 [t
2[ 3
[ [
= s [ + (2s + (1/15)s )[
[
−2 0
= −4 + 2t + t3 /15

Thus, we have found that

t2 − 4 −2 ≤ t < 0
F (t) =
−4 + 2t + t3 /15 0 < t ≤ 5

As before, we didn’t define F at t = 0 yet. Since f is Riemann Integrable on [−2, 5], we know
from the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus that F must be continuous. F is clearly continuous on
either side of 0 and we note that limt → 0− F (t) which is F (0− ) is −4, which is exactly the value of
F (0+ ). Hence, F is indeed continuous at 0 and we can write

t2 − 4 −2 ≤ t ≤ 0
F (t) =
−4 + 2t + t3 /15 0 ≤ t ≤ 5

What about the differentiability of F ? The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus guarantees that F has
a derivative at each point where f is continuous and at those points F ' (t) = f (t). Hence, we know
this is true at all t except 0. Note at those t, we find

2t −2 ≤ t < 0
F ' (t) =
2 + (1/5)t2 0 < t ≤ 5

which is exactly what we expect. However, when we look at the one-sided derivatives, we find
F ' (0− ) = 0 and F ' (0+ ) = 2. Hence, since the right- and left-hand derivatives do not match,
we see F ' (0) does not exist. Finally, note F is not the antiderivative of f on [−2, 5] because of this
mismatch.

Homework

t
Exercise 2.2.1 Compute −3
f (s) ds for

⎨ 3t −3 ≤ t < 0
f (t) = 6 t = 0
(1/6)t2 0 < t ≤ 6

1. Graph f and F carefully labeling all interesting points.

2. Verify that F is continuous and differentiable at all points but F ' (0) does not match f (0) and
so F is not the antiderivative of f on [−3, 6].
t
Exercise 2.2.2 Compute −3
f (s) ds for

⎨ 3t −3 ≤ t < 0
f (t) = 6 t = 0
(1/6)t2 + 2 0 < t ≤ 6

AN OVERVIEW OF RIEMANN INTEGRATION 27

1. Graph f and F carefully labeling all interesting points.

2. Verify that F is continuous and differentiable at all points except 0 and so F is not the an­
tiderivative of f on [−3, 6].
Chapter 3

Functions of Bounded Variation

Now that we have seen a quick overview of what Riemann Integration entails, let’s go back and look
at it very carefully. This will enable us to extend it to a more general form of integration called
Riemann - Stieljtes. From what we already know about Riemann integrals, the Riemann integral is
a mapping φ which is linear and whose domain is some subspace of the vector space of all bounded
functions. Let B([a, b]) denote this vector space which is a normed linear space using the usual
infinity norm. The set of all Riemann Integrable functions can be denoted by the symbol RI([a, b])
and we know it is a subspace of B([a, b]). We also know that the subspace C([a, b]) of all continuous
functions on [a, b] is contained in RI([a, b]). In fact, if P C([a, b]) is the set of all functions on [a, b]
that are piecewise continuous, then P C([a, b]) is also a vector subspace contained in RI([a, b]).
Hence, we know φ : RI([a, b]) ⊆ B([a, b]) → � is a linear functional on the subspace RI([a, b]).
Also, if f is not zero, then
b b
| a
f (t) dt | a
| f (t) | dt

|| f ||∞ || f ||∞
b
a
|| f ||∞ dt
≤ =b−a
|| f ||∞

Thus, we see that || φ ||op is finite and φ is a bounded linear functional on a subspace of B[a, b] if
we use the infinity norm on RI([a, b]). But of course, we can choose other norms. There are clearly
many functions in B([a, b]) that do not fit nicely into the development process for the Riemann
Integral. So let N I([a, b]) denote a new subspace of functions which contains RI([a, b]). We know
that the Riemann integral satisfies an important idea in analysis called limit interchange. That is, if
a sequence of functions {fn } from RI([a, b]) converges in infinity norm to f that the following facts
hold:

1. f is also in RI([a, b]).

2. The classic limit interchange holds:


b b
lim fn (t) dt = lim fn (t) dt
n→∞ a a n→∞

We can say this more abstractly as this: if fn → f in || · ||∞ in RI([a, b]), then f remains in
RI([a, b]) and

lim φ (fn ) = φ lim fn


n→∞ n→∞

29
30 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

But if we wanted to extend φ to the larger subspace N I([a, b]) in such a way that it remained a
bounded linear functional, we would also want to know what kind of sequence convergence we
should use in order for the interchange ideas to work. There are lots of questions:
1. Do we need to impose a norm on our larger subspace N I([a, b])?
2. Can we characterize the subspace N I([a, b]) in some fashion?
3. If the extension is called φ̂, we want to make sure that φ̂ is exactly φ when we restrict our
attention to functions in RI([a, b])?
Also, do we have to develop integration only on finite intervals [a, b] of �? How do we extend the
ideas of integration to other kinds of subsets? How do we even extend traditional Riemann integration
to unbounded intervals of �? All of these questions will be answered in the upcoming chapters, but
first we will see how far we can go with the traditional Riemann approach. We will also see where
the Riemann integral approach breaks down and makes us start to think of more general tools so that
we can get our work done.

3.1 Partitions
Definition 3.1.1 Partition

A partition of the finite interval [a, b] is a finite collection of points, {x0 , . . . , xn }, ordered
so that a = x0 < x1 < · · · < xn = b. We denote the partition by π and call each point xi
a partition point.

For each j = 1, . . . , n − 1, we let Δxj = xj+1 − xj . The collection of all finite partitions of [a, b] is
denoted Π[a, b].
Definition 3.1.2 Partition Refinements

The partition π1 = {y0 , . . . , ym } is said to be a refinement of the partition π2 =


{x0 , . . . , xn } if every partition point xj ∈ π2 is also in π1 . If this is the case, then we
write π2 j π1 , and we say that π1 is finer than π2 or π2 is coarser than π1 .

Definition 3.1.3 Common Refinement

Given π1 , π2 ∈ Π[a, b], there is a partition π3 ∈ Π[a, b] which is formed by taking the
union of π1 and π2 and using common points only once. We call this partition the common
refinement of π1 and π2 and denote it by π3 = π1 ∨ π2 .

Comment 3.1.1 The relation j is a partial ordering of Π[a, b]. It is not a total ordering, since not
all partitions are comparable. There is a coarsest partition, also called the trivial partition. It is
given by π0 = {a, b}. We may also consider uniform partitions of order k. Let h = (b − a)/k. Then
π = {x0 = a, x0 + h, x0 + 2h, . . . , xk−1 = x0 + (k − 1)h, xk = b}.
Proposition 3.1.1 Refinements and Common Refinements

If π1 , π2 ∈ Π[a, b], then π1 j π2 if and only if π1 ∨ π2 = π2 .

Proof 3.1.1
If π1 j π2 , then π1 = {x0 , . . . , xp } ⊂ {y0 , . . . , yq } = π2 . Thus, π1 ∪ π2 = π2 , and we have
π1 ∨ π2 = π2 . Conversely, suppose π1 ∨ π2 = π2 . By definition, every point of π1 is also a point of
π1 ∨ π2 = π2 . So, π1 j π2 . �
BOUNDED VARIATION 31

Definition 3.1.4 The Gauge or Norm of a Partition

For π ∈ Π[a, b], we define the gauge of π, denoted 1π1, by 1π1 = max{Δxj : 1 ≤ j ≤ p}.

Homework

Exercise 3.1.1 Prove that the relation j is a partial ordering of Π[a, b].
Exercise 3.1.2 Fix π1 ∈ Π[a, b]. The set C(π1 ) = {π ∈ Π[a, b] : π1 j π} is called the core
determined by π1 . It is the set of all partitions of [a, b] that contain (or are finer than) π1 .

1. Prove that if π1 j π2 , then C(π2 ) ⊂ C(π1 ).

2. Prove that if 1π1 1 < E, then 1π1 < E for all π ∈ C(π1 ).

3. Prove that if 1π1 1 < E and π2 ∈ Π[a, b], then 1π1 ∨ π2 1 < E.

3.2 Monotone Functions


In our investigations of how monotone functions behave, we will need two fundamental facts about
infimum and supremum of a set of numbers which are given in Lemma 3.2.1 and Lemma 3.2.2. First,
recall the Infimum Tolerance Lemma:
Lemma 3.2.1 The Infimum Tolerance Lemma

Let S be a nonempty set of numbers that is bounded below. Then given any tolerance E,
there is at least one element s in S so that

inf(S) ≤ s < inf(S) + E

Proof 3.2.1
This is an easy proof by contradiction. Assume there is some E so that no matter what s from S we
choose, we have

s ≥ inf(S) + E

This says that inf(S) + E is a lower bound for S and so by definition, inf(S) must be bigger than or
equal to this lower bound. But this is clearly not possible. So the assumption that such a tolerance E
exists is wrong and the conclusion follows. �

Then, recall the Supremum Tolerance Lemma:


Lemma 3.2.2 The Supremum Tolerance Lemma

Let T be a nonempty set of numbers that is bounded above. Then given any tolerance E,
there is at least one element t in T so that

sup(T ) − E < t ≤ sup(T )

Proof 3.2.2
This again is an easy proof by contradiction and we include it for completeness. Assume there is
32 BASIC ANALYSIS IV: MEASURE THEORY AND INTEGRATION

some E so that no matter what t from T we choose, we have

t ≤ sup(T ) − E

This says that sup(T ) − E is an upper bound for T and so by definition, sup(T ) must be less than or
equal to this upper bound. But this is clearly not possible. So the assumption that such a tolerance E
exists is wrong and the conclusion must follow. �

We are now in a position to discuss carefully monotone functions and other functions built from
them. We follow discussions in (Douglas (2) 1996) at various places.

Definition 3.2.1 Monotone Functions

A real-valued function f : [a, b] → � is said to be increasing (respectively, strictly increas­


ing) if x1 , x2 ∈ [a, b], x1 < x2 ⇒ f (x1 ) ≤ f (x2 ) (respectively, f (x1 ) < f (x2 )). Similar
definitions hold for decreasing and strictly decreasing functions.

Theorem 3.2.3 A Monotone Function Estimate

Let f be increasing on [a, b], and let π = {x0 , . . . , xp } be in Π[a, b]. For any c ∈ [a, b],
define

f (c+ ) = lim f (x) and f (c− ) = lim− f (x)


x→c+ x→c

where we define f (a− ) = f (a) and f (b+ ) = f (b). Then


p


[f (x+
j ) − f (xj )] ≤ f (b) − f (a)
j=0

Proof 3.2.3
First, we note that f (x+ ) and f (x− ) always exist. The proof of this is straightforward. For x ∈ (a, b],
let Tx = {f (y) : a ≤ y < x}. Then Tx is bounded above by f (x), since f is monotone increas­
ing. Hence, Tx has a well-defined supremum. Let E > 0 be given. Then, using the Supremum
Tolerance Lemma, Lemma 3.2.2, there is a y ∗ ∈ [a, x) such that sup Tx − E < f (y ∗ ) ≤ sup Tx .
For any y ∈ (y ∗ , x), we have f (y ∗ ) ≤ f (y) since f is increasing. Thus, 0 ≤ (sup Tx − f (y)) ≤
(sup Tx −f (y ∗ )) < E for y ∈ (y ∗ , x). Let δ = (x−y ∗ )/2. Then, if 0 < x−y < δ, sup Tx −f (y) < E.
Since E was arbitrary, this shows that limy→x− f (y) = supTx . The proof for f (x+ ) is similar, using
the Infimum Tolerance Lemma, Lemma 3.2.1. You should be able to see that f (x− ) is less than or
equal to f (x+ ) for all x. We will define f (a− ) = f (a) and f (b+ ) = f (b) since f is not defined prior
to a or after b.

To prove the stated result holds, first choose an arbitrary yj ∈ (xj , xj+1 ) for each j = 0, . . . , p − 1.
Then, since f is increasing, for each j = 1, . . . , p, we have f (yj−1 ) ≤ f (x− +
j ) ≤ f (xj ) ≤ f (yj ).
Thus,

f (x+
j ) − f (xj ) ≤ f (yj ) − f (yj−1 ) (3.1)
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but vital” is one description of the sector. If it were lost, it would
uncover ground as far back as Morval. If held, it screened our
ground westward almost as far as Combles. (Again, one must bear
in mind the extreme minuteness of the setting of the picture, for
Combles here was barely three thousand yards from the front line.)
The reports of the Eighth Division who handed it over were not
cheering. The front-line posts had been ten of ten men apiece, set
irregularly in the remnants of an old trench. The only way to deal with
them was to dig out and rebuild altogether on metal framings, and
the Sappers had so treated four. The other six were collapsing. They
needed, too, a line of efficient support-posts, in rear, and had
completed one, but wire was scarce. All support and reserve
trenches were wet, shallow, and badly placed. A largish dug-out a
hundred yards behind the front had been used as Battalion
Headquarters by various occupants, German and French, and, at
one stage of its career, as a dressing-station, but it seemed that the
doctors “had only had time to pull upstairs the men who died and
dump them in heaps a few yards away from the doorway. Later,
apparently, some one had scattered a few inches of dirt over them
which during our occupation the continual rain and snow washed
away. The result was most grisly.” The French have many virtues,
but tidiness in the line is not one of them.
The whole situation turned on holding the reverse of the ridge,
since, if the enemy really meant business, it was always open to him
to blow us off the top of it, and come down the gentle descent from
the crest at his ease. So they concentrated on the front posts and a
strong, well-wired reserve line, half-way down the slope. Luckily
there was a trench-tramway in the sector, running from the Sappers’
dump on the Frégicourt road to close up to the charnel-house-ex-
dressing-station. The regular trains, eight trucks pushed by two men
each, were the 5, 7, and 9 p. m., but on misty days a 3 p. m. might
also be run, and of course trains could run in the night. This saved
them immense backaches. (“But, mark you, the easier the dam’ stuff
gets up to the front the more there is of it, and so the worse ’tis for
the poor devils of wiring-parties that has to lay it out after dark. Then
Jerry whizz-bangs ye the rest of the long night. All this fine labour-
saving means the devil for the Micks.”)
The Germans certainly whizz-banged the working-parties
generously, but the flights as a rule buried themselves harmlessly in
the soft ground. We on our side made no more trouble than could be
avoided, but worked on the wire double tides. In the heat of the job,
on the night of the 11th January, the Brigadier came round and the
C.O. took him out to see Captain Alexander’s party wiring their
posts. It was the worst possible moment for a valuable brigadier to
wander round front lines. The moon lit up the snow and they beheld
a party of Germans advancing in open order, who presently lay down
and were joined by more. At eighty yards or so they halted, and after
a short while crawled away. “We did not provoke battle, as we would
probably have hurt no one, and we wanted to get on with our wiring.”
But had the Brigadier been wasted in a mere front-line bicker, the
C.O., not to mention Captain Alexander, would have heard of it.
By the time that the 1st Coldstream relieved them on the 14th
January, the Battalion had fenced their private No Man’s Land and
about six hundred yards of the line outside the posts, all under the
come-and-go of shell-fire; had duck-boarded tracks connecting some
of the posts; systematised their ration- and water-supply, and
captured a multitude of army socks whereby companies coming
down from their turn could change and be dry. Dull as all such detail
sounds, it is beyond question that the arrangement and prevision of
domestic works appeals to certain temperaments, not only among
the officers but men. They positively relish the handling and
disposition of stores, the fitting of one job into the next, the race
against time, the devising of tricks and gadgets for their own poor
comforts, and all the mixture of housemaking and keeping (in which,
whatever may be said, the male animal excels) on the edge of war.
For the moment, things were absurdly peaceful on their little front,
and when they came back to work after three still days at Maurepas,
infantry “fighting” had become a farce. The opposing big guns
hammered away zealously at camps and back-areas, but along that
line facing the desolate woods of St. Pierre Vaast there was mutual
toleration, due to the fact that no post could be relieved on either
side except by the courtesy of their opponents who lay, naked as
themselves, from two hundred to thirty yards away. Thus men
walked about, and worked in flagrant violation of all the rules of
warfare, beneath the arch of the droning shells overhead. The Irish
realised this state of affairs gradually—their trenches were not so
close to the enemy; but on the right Battalion’s front, where both
sides lived in each others’ pockets, men reported “life in the most
advanced posts was a perfect idyll.” So it was decided, now that
every one might be presumed to know the ground, and be ready for
play, that the weary game should begin again. But observe the
procedure! “It was obvious it would be unfair, after availing ourselves
of an unwritten agreement, to start killing people without warning.”
Accordingly, notices were issued by the Brigade—in English—which
read: “Warning. Any German who exposes himself after daylight to-
morrow January 19 will be shot. By order.” Battalions were told to get
these into the enemy lines, if possible, between 5 and 7 a. m. They
anticipated a little difficulty in communicating their kind intentions, but
two heralds, with three rifles to cover them, were sent out and told to
stick the warnings up on the German wire in the dusk of the dawn.
Now, one of these men was No. 10609 Private King, who, in civil life,
had once been policeman in the Straits Settlements. He saw a
German looking over the parapet while the notice was being affixed,
and, policeman-like, waved to him to come out. The German
beckoned to King to come in, but did not quit the trench. King then
warned the other men to stand by him, and entered into genial talk.
Other Germans gathered round the first, who, after hesitating
somewhat, walked to his side of the wire. He could talk no English,
and King, though he tried his best, in Chinese and the kitchen-Malay
of Singapore, could not convey the situation to him either. At last he
handed the German the notice and told him to give it to his officer.
The man seemed to understand. He was an elderly person, with his
regimental number in plain sight on his collar. He saw King looking at
this, and desired King to lift the edge of his leather jerkin so that he
in turn might get our number. King naturally refused and, to
emphasise what was in store for careless enemies, repeated with
proper pantomime: “Shoot! Shoot! Pom! Pom!” This ended the
palaver. They let him get back quite unmolested, and when the mirth
had ceased, King reported that they all seemed to be “oldish men,
over yonder, and thoroughly fed up.” Next dawn saw no more
unbuttoned ease or “idyllic” promenades along that line.
As the days lengthened arctic cold set in. The tracks between the
posts became smears of black ice, and shells burst brilliantly on
ground that was as pave-stones to the iron screw-stakes of the
wiring. One shell caught a carrying-party on the night of the 20th
January, slightly wounding Lieutenant Hanbury who chanced to be
passing at the time, and wounding Sergeant Roddy and two men.
The heavies behind them used the morning of the 21st to register on
their left and away to the north. By some accident (the Battalion did
not conceive their sector involved) a big shell landed in the German
trench opposite one of their posts, and some thirty Huns broke cover
and fled back over the rise. One of them, lagging behind the covey,
deliberately turned and trudged across the snow to give himself up to
us. Outside one of our posts he as deliberately knelt down, covered
his face with his hands and prayed for several minutes. Whereupon
our men instead of shooting shouted that he should come in. He was
a Pole from Posen and the east front; very, very sick of warfare. This
gave one Russian, one Englishman, and a Pole as salvage for six
weeks. An attempt at a night-raid on our part over the crackling snow
was spoiled because the divisional stores did not run to the
necessary “six white night-shirts” indented for, but only long canvas
coats of a whitey-brown which in the glare of Very lights showed up
hideously.
A month of mixed fatigues followed ere they saw that sector again.
They cleaned up at Morval on the 22nd, and spent a few days at the
Briquetterie near Bernafay Corner, where three of the companies
worked at a narrow-gauge line just outside Morval, under sporadic
long-range shell-fire, and the fourth went to Ville in divisional
reserve. The winter cold ranged from ten to twenty degrees of frost
in the Nissen huts. Whereby hangs this tale. The mess stove was
like Falstaff, “old, cold, and of intolerable entrails,” going out on the
least provocation. Only a few experts knew how to conciliate the
sensitive creature, and Father Knapp, the R.C. chaplain, was not
one of them. Indeed, he had been explicitly warned on no account
whatever to attempt to stoke it. One bitter morning, however, he
found himself alone in the mess with the stove just warming up, and
a sand-bag, stuffed with what felt like lumps of heaven-sent coal,
lying on the floor. Naturally, he tipped it all in. But it was the mess
Perrier water, which had been thus swaddled to save it from freezing
—as the priest and the exploding stove found out together. There
were no casualties, though roof and walls were cut with glass, but
the stove never rightly recovered from the shock, nor did Father
Knapp hear the last of it for some time.
From the close of the month till the 19th of February they were in
divisional reserve, all together at Ville in unbroken frost. While there
(February 1), Lieutenant F. St. L. Greer, one of the best of officers
and the most popular of comrades, was wounded in a bombing
accident and died the next day. In a battalion as closely knit together
as the 2nd Irish Guards all losses hit hard.
Just as the thaw was breaking, they were sent up to Priez Farm, a
camp of elephant huts, dug-outs and shelters where the men were
rejoiced to get up a real “frowst” in the confined quarters. Warriors do
not love scientific ventilation. From the 16th to the 25th February, the
mud being in full possession of the world again, they were at Billon,
which has no good name, and on the 25th back at St. Pierre Vaast,
on the same sector they had left a month before. Nothing much had
been done to the works; for the German host—always at its own
time and in its own methodical way—was giving way to the British
pressure, and the Battalion was warned that their business would be
to keep touch with any local withdrawal by means of patrols (Anglice,
small parties playing blind-man’s buff with machine-gun posts), and
possibly to do a raid or two. But it is interesting to see that since their
departure from that sector all the ten posts which they had dug and
perspired over, and learned to know by their numbers, which
automatically come back to a man’s memory on his return, had been
re-numbered by the authorities. It was a small thing, but good men
have been killed by just such care.
They watched and waited. The air was full of rumours of the
Germans’ shifting—the home papers called it “cracking”—but facts
and news do not go together even in peace. (“What annoyed us
were the newspaper reports of how we were getting on when we
weren’t getting on at all.”)
The Twenty-ninth Division on their left were due to put in a two-
Battalion attack from Sailly-Saillisel on the dawn of the 28th
February, while the battalion in the front line was to send up a
smoke-screen to distract the enemy and draw some of his barrages
on to themselves. So front-line posts were thinned out as much as
possible, and front companies sent out patrols to see that the Hun in
front of them was working happily, and that he had not repaired a
certain gap in his wire which our guns had made and were keeping
open for future use. All went well till the wind shifted and the smoke
was ordered “off,” and when the Twenty-ninth Division attacked, the
tail of the enemy barrage caught the Battalion unscreened but did no
harm. A heavy fog then shut down sarcastically on the whole battle,
which was no success to speak of. Through it all the Battalion kept
guard over their own mouse-holes and the gap in the wire. Sudden
activities of our guns or the enemies’ worried them at times and bred
rumours, all fathered on the staff, of fantastic victories somewhere
down the line. They saw a battalion of Germans march by platoons
into St. Pierre Vaast Wood, warned the nearest artillery group, and
watched the heavies searching the wood; heard a riot of bombing
away on their left, which they put down to the situation at Sailly-
Saillisel (this was on the 1st of March), and got ready for possible
developments; and when it all died out again, duly sent forth the
patrols, who reported the “enemy laughing, talking, and working.”
There was no sign of any withdrawal there.
On the 6th March, in snow and frost, they took over from the 1st
Coldstream a new and unappetising piece of front on the left which
the Coldstream had taken over from the Twenty-ninth Division. It
consisted of a line of “about twelve so-called posts which were
practically little more than shell-holes.” The Coldstream had worked
like beavers to get them into some sort of shape, but their
predecessors had given the local snipers far too much their head;
and the long, flat-topped ridge where, under an almost full moon,
every moving man offended the sky-line, was as unwholesome as
could be desired. The Coldstream had lost six men sniped the night
before their relief, and it was impossible to reach two of the posts at
all. Another post was practically untenable, as the enemy had direct
observation on to it, and one sniper who specialised in this
neighbourhood had accounted for fourteen men in one tour. The
Battalion settled down, therefore, to fire generously at anything that
fired. It was noisy and, maybe, wasteful, but it kept the snipers’
heads down.

Emery Walker Ltd. del. et sc.


THE SOMME
Second Battalion
PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY EMERY WALKER LTD., LONDON

On the 7th March it was clear that the troops in front of them had
been replaced by a more cautious and aggressive enemy. So the
Battalion turned a couple of their most untenable posts into listening-
posts, occupied by night only, and some one suggested that the new
artillery which had just come in behind them might put down a
creeping barrage for the greater discouragement of snipers. They
cleared out a post or two first, in anticipation of stray shots, and lost
one man killed and one wounded; but when the barrage arrived it
was weak and inaccurate. Guns need time to learn to work in well
with their brethren ahead, and the latter are apt to be impatient when
they think they are being experimented on.

T h e G e r m a n W i t h d r awa l
Not till towards mid-March did the much-written-of German “crack”
affect their chilly world. The C.O.’s of the battalions conferred at
Brigade Headquarters on the 13th to discuss the eventuality, and in
the middle of it the Major-General came in and announced there was
good reason to think that the retirement in front of them would begin
that night. In which case, so soon as scouts had reported that the
enemy trenches were held very lightly or had been abandoned (“But
Jerry never abandoned his dam’ machine-guns till we was on top of
’em”), two patrols from each company in the front line, of an officer
and twelve men apiece, would go forward on schedule time and
occupy. They would be followed by the two front companies, who
would make good the enemy’s old front and support lines. With two
battalions in the front line to draw from, this made a force of four
companies, all of whom were to be under the command of the Senior
Lieut.-Colonel in the battalions engaged. He would be known as
“O.C. Situation Centre,” and would issue all orders, acting as in
command of an advanced guard. But the two reserve companies of
the battalions in line would be with the main body of the brigade and
would not move without the Brigadier’s direct orders. In other words,
no one was to be drawn into anything like a vulgar brawl. And on the
14th March, from a hill near by, a vast fire could be seen far off,
which was Péronne a-burning. That same afternoon the enemy
began shelling their own front line along the western edge of St.
Pierre Vaast Wood. The situation betrayed itself. An officer’s patrol
out from the 1st Scots Guards reported the enemy gone from in
front. Whereupon the battalions in the line, the 2nd Irish Guards and
the 1st Coldstream, moved out cautiously at dusk and established
themselves partly in the first of the enemies’ abandoned trenches,
with supports, more or less, in our old front line. When their relief
came it was a pitch-black night, and the Coldstream had pushed out
some patrols into bits of the German trench beyond the chaos of No
Man’s Land, who, naturally, did not even themselves know where in
France they might be, but had to be discovered and relieved just the
same, which took the relieving battalion till two o’clock in the
morning. At three o’clock the C.O. of the 2nd Irish Guards—Colonel
E. B. Greer—was warned that “Situation Centre”—the two advanced
companies who were to beat out hidden snipers—would be formed
at 7 a. m. By the accident of Lieut.-Colonel Godman of the Scots
Guards being sick, it fell to Greer to command that advanced force.
Captain Alexander took our two forward companies, and Captain Sir
Ian Colquhoun the two companies of the Scots Guards. The general
advance was to begin all along the divisional front at 10 a. m. By that
hour the German shelling was intense. They used 5.9’s and larger,
as they were firing from a long way back. The trouble for the 2nd
Irish Guards companies developed almost at once on their left,
where their patrol was fired at by machine-guns from a German
trench on the edge of the wood. Their own 1st Battalion, trying to
push out of Sailly-Saillisel, was hung up, too—they heard and saw it
—for the same reason. The Division could have driven through at the
cost of fairly heavy casualties, but nothing was to be gained by
wasting men in rushes on hidden machine-guns that can lay out
thirty good lives in two minutes. The Scots Guards got on into the
wood without much trouble at first, till they, too, ran on snipers
between tree-stumps and up and down the defaced trenches, or
opened some single machine-gun slinking from cover to cover. It
was all slow “feeling,” with alternating advances at walking pace, and
long checks—“something like drawing a gorse for wolves instead of
foxes.” The shelling through the day was heavy, but ineffective. With
such a broken line as ours advancing, the enemy could not tell
where any portion was in strength. The force lay up where they
happened to stop, and before dawn on the 16th March were told to
feel ahead, while the Scots Guards on their right got into touch with
the Eighth Division. Progress was slow as the day before, under
heavy shelling—sometimes considered and dealt out with intention—
at others evidently from a battery using up ammunition before going
back. As they worked their way more into St. Pierre Vaast Wood
came the sensation, which there was no mistaking, that they were
being played with by the Hun, and losing touch as he intended them
to do. Certain vital trenches would be controlled by a few snipers and
machine-guns; a sunk road offering shelter would be plastered with
heavies, and a full company would be held in it, digging for more
cover, by dead accurate long-range fire; while far and far behind the
orderly German withdrawal of the main body continued in peace.
On the 17th March, for example, “we were never really in touch
with the enemy’s rear-guard during the day except for one or two
snipers.” On the 18th, “by daybreak we were out of touch with the
enemy, and cavalry patrols of King Edward’s Horse and the 21st
Lancers went through us.” Here is the comment of the time and the
place on our advance: “The German retreat was conducted very
skilfully. One cannot say that we caused them to leave one position
an hour before they intended. They inflicted upon us a considerable
number of casualties (twenty in this battalion, while on our left the 1st
Battalion lost considerably more). On the other hand, we saw no
evidence that in the actual retirement we had even damaged one
German. They left little or nothing behind.”
And the professional judgment is equally fair. “But of course it
must be remembered that the task of the (German) regimental
officers was an easy one, however difficult it may have been for the
Staff. Given time, there is no difficulty in withdrawing battalions from
trenches by night, for a few snipers and machine-gunners, knowing
the ground, and retreating from trench to trench, can hang up an
advance indefinitely unless the troops advancing have strong
reserves and are prepared for heavy losses.”
This last was not our situation. The Fourteenth Corps had no
divisions in immediate reserve; the sector the Guards Division was
working on had been greatly thinned out, and their artillery was
relatively small. With tremendous losses in the past and the certainty
of more to come, things had to be done as cheaply as possible.
“Hence our mode of advance.” It led them into a stale hell which had
once been soil of France but was now beyond grace, hope, or
redemption. Most of the larger trees in St. Pierre Vaast were cut
down, and the smaller ones split by shell or tooth-brushed by
machine-gun fire. The ground was bog, studded with a few island-
like formations of fire-trench, unrevetted, unboarded, with little dug-
outs ten or twelve feet deep, all wet and filthy. There were no regular
latrines. Numberless steel helmets and heaps of stick-bombs lay
about under foot. The garrisons must have been deadly
uncomfortable, and there was good evidence that the enemy had
economised men beyond anything that we dared. The ground had
been cut to bits by our fire, and in one place yawned what had been
a battery position wiped out, unseeing and unseen, weeks ago, as
the dead teams round it testified. Very few booby-traps were left
behind. The Battalion lost only five men in all through this cause.

Fat i g u e s o n t h e S o m m e
And on March 19 they came away from the filth and the multitudes
of scattered, distorted dead who grimaced at them over their victory,
and were laid off at Montauban next day, to be railway navvies for a
few weeks. Their camp had last been occupied by a “labour”
battalion. “It would be quite impossible to exaggerate the state of filth
in which we found this place. No tins had apparently been burned or
buried for months, and rotting matter lay all over the ground.”
Something like this has been observed before by other battalions
about labour corps. However, they mucked it out into moderate
decency, and went daily with the 3rd Grenadiers and the 4th
Coldstream to make the broad-gauge line from Trônes Wood to
Rocquigny and eventually into Ypres. Eventually, when the Sappers
had taught them a little, they slapped it down at the rate of more than
half a mile a day. It meant at the last four hours’ marching to reach
railhead, and as many hours of strenuous work when they got there.
But “the men were quite happy in spite of the long hours and the
absolutely vile weather.” They could acquire all the fuel they needed,
and had no drills or parades. To toil with your belts or braces
disposed as you please; and to wear your cap at outrageous civilian
angles; to explain to your desk-bred N.C.O. (with reminiscences, till
he cuts you short) that you have had experience on this job in civil
life, repairing Dublin trams; to delve in a clean dirt uncumbered by
stringy bundles that have once been the likes of yourself; to return,
singing, down the road to bountiful meals and a satisfactory “frowst”
afterwards, are primitive pleasures far above pay or glory.
Their navvying at one camp or another along the rail lasted till
almost the end of April. They were rather pleased with the country
round them near Rocquigny, because there was grass on it, and they
found passable football grounds. It was a queer, part rural, part
mechanical, part military life, in which people grew fat and jovial, and
developed sides of their character that the strain of responsibility had
hid. The Battalion made friendships, too, with troops in the railway
trade—men whom they met day after day at the same place and job,
just as though people on the Somme lived for ever. They were taught
how to ballast permanent ways, or lever the eternally derailed troop-
and construction-trains back on to the sprawling metals.
On the 27th April they were all called in from their scattered
labours, reminded that they were guards once more, and promised a
long programme of field-training. Inevitably, then, the evening after,
came orders to strike their camp at Bois de Hem, pitch it on the
Lesbœufs road and get back to road-work between Ginchy,
Lesbœufs, and Le Transloy. The march was hot and dusty; which
impressed them, for they had forgotten heat. Camp lay close to
where the right of the 2nd Guards Brigade had reached, in the battle
of September 15, 1916. Here is the picture. The site “had been
under severe shell-fire all the winter, so little burying could be done.
Before we could pitch the camp we had to get rid of several dead
men, and all the country between Lesbœufs and Le Transloy, as well
as towards Morval, was dotted with corpses. In one morning, No. 4
Company, incidental to its work on the roads, buried no less than
seventy Germans, English, and French. On Ginchy crest we found
the body of Lieutenant Montgomery. He had been killed commanding
No. 2 Company on September 13 of last year” (that was when No. 2
was wiped out on the eve of the battle of the 15th), “but we had
never been able to find him. He was buried on the crest.”
The desolation struck them with continuous horror. Most of the
troops had been moved on into the comparatively unspoiled country
to the eastward, but the Battalion was forced to sit down among the
dead in “mile on mile of tumbled earth, collapsing trenches with their
fringe of rotting sand-bags, tangles of rusted wire, and everywhere
little crosses. For variety, an occasional wood, in which the trees
were mere skeletons, shattered stumps with charred branches.” It is
a perfect etching of the Somme. They were impressed, too, by the
fiendish forethought and thoroughness with which all signs of civil life
and work, and, as far as might be, all means of reviving them, had
been wiped out, burned up, blasted off, cut down, or removed by the
Hun. Details of destruction and defilement, such as would only occur
to malignant apes, had been attended to as painstaking and lovingly
in the most unlikely corner of some poor village, as in the fields and
among the orchards and factories. They had to fill all shell-holes in
camp to make even standing ground for themselves, and, of course,
a football “field” came next. Every man returning from work brought
back his load of timber or iron out of the pitiful old trenches, not to
mention flowers from wrecked gardens, and “we built a regular
village.” Their road-mending consisted in digging out the shell-holes
till they reached firm ground, filling up with timber and brick (“easy to
find).” By this time specialisation had run its course by rail. And thus
they worked till the 9th May. But this was the last that was required
of them in that form.
They were turned down to training camp at Curlu, almost on the
banks of the Somme, in a clean and cleaned-up country where
“dead men, even, were hard to find.” By this time specialization had
run its course through our armies till the latest platoon-organisation
acknowledged but one section that was known as a “rifle” section.
The others, although behung with the ancient and honourable
weapons of their trade, were bomb, Lewis-gun, and rifle (sniper)
sections. But the Battle of Arras had proved what angry company
commanders had been saying for months past—that infantry lived or
died by their knowledge of the rifle. These Somme officers were
accordingly told that most of their time should be given to platoon-
training, fire direction, and musketry. (“We did what we were told, but
we always found out when it came to a pinch—suppressing
machine-guns in a pill-box and stuff of that kind—if you could rush
your men into proper position, good shooting did the rest.”) And just
as they were buckling down to the new orders, word came, on
Sunday, May 13, that they had better prepare for an inspection by
the King of the Belgians on Tuesday, May 15. The Brigade put up
one long “agony” of rehearsal, and to its own surprise managed to
achieve a creditable parade. Unlimited British generals attended the
royal visitor, and for the first time in the Battalion’s history their pipers
in their Celtic kilts were present. These had arrived about a fortnight
before, when the Battalion solemnly invited Captain Hugh Ross of
the Scots Guards to tea in his capacity of a “pipe expert” to
pronounce on their merits. And civil war did not follow!
On the 17th May they set out via Billon Farm camp to Méricourt
l’Abbé, where for the first time in six months, barring a few days at
Corbie in January, they were billeted in real houses such as human
beings use. Méricourt in summer is quite different from the cramped,
windy, damp Méricourt of winter. All the land smiled with the young
crops that the old, indefatigable French women and men were
cramming it with. Here, while the Guards Division was concentrating
preparatory to their move into war again, the battalions were trained
hard but not as specialists.
General Ivor Maxse, commanding the Sixteenth Corps (none but
corps generals can say certain things in public), lectured on some of
the teachings of the Battle of Arras. He gave instances of what
comes of divorcing the soldier from his rifle. On one occasion, said
he, men were met sidling down a road with the simple statement that
the Germans were advancing to counter-attack them, and that they
were retiring “because their own supply of bombs had run out.”
Patrols sent up to verify, found the counter-attack was being made
by four Huns furiously trying to surrender to some one. Again, a
company was heavily fired on from a wood about two hundred yards
off. Not a man returned the fire. They simply shouted down the
trench, “Pass the word for the snipers.” All of which proves what
every company commander knows, that the human mind under
stress of excitement holds but one idea at a time, or, as the drill
books of forty years ago laid down, “men will instinctively act in war
as they have been trained to act in peace.”
In spite of the growing crops and intense agriculture, the Battalion
found rifle ranges and did “a great deal of much-needed musketry.”
They wound up their stay at Méricourt in great glory at the Brigade
sports, sweeping off everything in sight—flat races, steeple-chase,
tug-of-war, and the rest, and winning their brigadier’s trophy to the
corps with the greatest number of firsts by a clear “possible” against
the whole Guards Division. (“’Tis this way. A good battalion will do
what is wanted; but a happy battalion, mark you, takes on from that.
Did we work at the Sports? Remember, we was all in the pink,
trained on that dam’ railway an’ fatted up for Boesinghe. What
chance had the rest of the Division against us at all?”)

Third Ypres and Boesinghe


They entrained on the 30th May as part of the vast concentration
that was crystallising itself for the Third Battle of Ypres, and, after
twelve hours, breakfasted at Arques, near St. Omer, and marched all
day to their crowded billets, which, like the rest of the landscape,
were loaded up with crops and difficult to train in. They knew nothing
of what was expected of them till 11th June, when C.O.’s were told at
Brigade Headquarters that they were to practise assaults from trench
to trench instead of “open warfare.” A battle, including earthquakes,
had taken place at Messines which had unkeyed the situation to a
certain extent, and the Guards Division would be needed to develop
it.
The screw would be applied next in the Salient, and they would go
up to Elverdinghe, on a sector that had long been notoriously quiet.
But they were assured that as soon as “Jerry” had word of their
arrival they would not feel neglected. All this on the top of their open-
warfare exercise was disappointing. They knew more than they
wanted to about the Ypres areas, and had hoped that something was
going to crack on the high and windy Somme and let them
triumphantly into Cambrai. “Fatted troops” are ever optimistic.
Their march towards their new ground was a hot and villainously
dusty one, with packs and steel helmets, of eleven miles and the
wind at their backs, so they moved in a sweating pillar of cloud. Not
a man of theirs fell out, and the Brigade knew it, for the C.O. of the
3rd Grenadiers, who were bringing up the rear, sent along written
congratulations with word that he had not seen one single Irish
guardsman panting by the wayside. To have won that little record
had meant the hardest sort of work for officers and N.C.O.’s.
On the 15th June they lay at Cardoen Farm, in shelters and huts
round the place on which the enemy had no direct observation,
though it was not four miles behind the line. Brigade Headquarters
was more or less underground at Elverdinghe Château, and the
enemy attended to it the instant the Guards Division relieved the
Thirty-eighth Division. The front lines, as usual hereabouts, were too
close together for unrestricted artillery work; but supports,
communications, railways, and battery positions were open to him,
and he dosed them by day and night. The divisional sector had a
frontage of about twelve hundred yards, which ran from the point
where our line bending back from the Ypres salient, turned across
the Yser Canal some five thousand yards north-north-west of Ypres
itself, and thence straight along the canal bank to where the Belgians
took on. The Battalion relieved the 1st Coldstream on the 18th June,
and found their front, which was on top of the canal embankment
and within fifty yards of the enemy’s, fairly good. Owing to water
showing at two feet, trenches were protected by breast-works and
well revetted, but liable, from their make, to be badly blown by direct
hits when, since it crowned the breast-works, their own wire would
hamper the occupants. The canal bed, empty and overgrown with
high grass and weeds, was all dead ground. The most that could be
said for the position was that it gave fair protection against shell, but
might be awkward to hold, as support and back-lines were much too
much under direct observation. Battalion Headquarters were
regularly shelled, and in Boesinghe village itself, the most dangerous
area of all, there was no cover, and one had to skirmish about in the
open, with both eyes and ears on what might be coming next. The
front, as usual, under these conditions was the safest. They were so
close to the enemy that they were not shelled at all. What little stuff
fell near them was the enemy’s own shorts, upon receipt of which
the German front line would loose protesting rockets. Support and
reserve companies were regularly shelled, with the ration and water
parties pushing supplies up the railway in trucks from Elverdinghe to
B.H.Q. The Battalion’s normal work was repairing blown head-cover
and breast-work, and reporting, with oaths, that it was impossible to
dig on account of subsoil water. They indulged the enemy every
early morning with five minutes’ “rapid” of Lewis-guns or rifles, and
their Stokes mortars were busy day and night. Machine-guns
(nothing can keep a machine-gunner quiet long) sprayed enemy
dumps intermittently all night long. It was an intimate, uneasy dog’s
life of dodging and ducking; yet with reliefs and all it only cost them
twenty-four casualties, mostly slight, in the four days’ turn. Their rest
at Cardoen Farm afterwards meant fatigues of carrying sand-bags
and six casualties to show for it; a brisk shelling of the camp; and a
brawl between their Lewis-gun battery and one of the wandering Hun
planes with which the camps were so infested that they were hardly
noticed in reports or letters.
Their next tour, June 27 to 29, was in support behind the canal, in
dug-outs round Bleuet Farm; Battalion Headquarters in the remnants
of the farm itself. Our own artillery seemed, from the infantry point of
view, to be devoting its attention to building up dumps and bringing in
more guns; so the enemy had it rather their own way in shelling
working-parties and communications. The relief was a bad one, and
that tour worked out at nineteen casualties, of whom six were dead.
They ended June in wet bivouacs at a camp near International
Corner, which had an unsavoury reputation for being shelled, and
under the shadow of a specially heavy fatigue of burying a cable in a
forward area. But—army fashion—nothing happened. No shells
arrived; it was too wet even for parades, and some other lucky
battalion had that cable-picnic all to itself.
On the 2nd July they were marched off twelve miles to Herzeele,
where as no billets were ready they dined in a field, and shook down
afterwards among a crowd of gunners. Many tales have been told of
happy Herzeele, for it boasted at that time no less than three town
majors, every one of them a colonel! Hence some small muddle as
to billets.
The immense preparations for what was to be the Third Battle of
the Ypres included, for the Guards Division, ten days’ special training
over trenches such as they would have to deal with when their turn
came. These were duly dug by fatigue-parties in an open stretch of
country near the town, and “the whole model was on the same scale
as the actual German front-line system.” Although the existing
features of the ground were puzzling at first, the model proved to be
extremely useful as teaching all ranks the lie of the land.
The only features not included were the hidden concrete “pill-
boxes” supporting each other behind his line, on which the enemy
was basing his new and unpleasant system of elastic defence. But,
allowing for inevitable unrealities, there is no doubt that training “on
the model” supplies and brings a battalion to hand better than any
other device. The men grow keen as they realise by eye what is to
be expected; talk it over afterwards (there are certain analogies
between trench-to-trench attack and “soccer”); the N.C.O.’s discuss
with the officers, and the battalion commander can check some
preventable errors before the real thing is loosed.
His Majesty the King came on the 6th July to watch a brigade
attack in the new formation. It was a perfect success, but the next
week saw them sweated through it again and again in every detail,
till “as far as the Battalion was concerned the drill of the attack was
reduced almost to perfection.” In their rare leisure came
conferences, map- and aeroplane-study, and, most vital of all,
“explaining things to the N.C.O.’s and men.” They wound up with a
model of a foot to a hundred yards, giving all the features in the
Battalion’s battle-area. The men naturally understood this better than
a map, but it was too small. (“’Twas like a doll’s-house garden, and it
looked you would be across and over it all in five minutes. But we
was not! We was not!”)
On the 14th, in hot weather, the move towards the cockpit began.
They bivouacked in certain selected woods that gave cover against
searching planes, who knew as much about it as the enemy staff did,
and bombed all movements on principle.
On the 17th they went into line “for a tour which proved to be one
of the most unpleasant and most expensive” since the Battalion
came to France. They held the whole of the 2nd Guards Brigade
frontage, with a battalion of the 3rd Guards Brigade on their left, so
the companies were necessarily broken up, as their platoons were
detached to the separate trenches. All No. 4 Company and two
platoons of No. 3 were in the front line, and a platoon of No. 3 and
Company H.Q. in the support-line near Hunter Street. In Walkrantz
Trench was another platoon of No. 3; No. 1 Company was in an
unwholesome support-trench; and working with it, one platoon of No.
2. In Bleuet Farm were the remaining three platoons of No. 2
Company; and Battalion Headquarters were in Chasseur Farm,
about a hundred and fifty yards behind No. 1 Company. Altogether, it
might fairly be called a “hurrah’s nest” to relieve, hold, or get away
from. The enemy, even without being stirred up by our first series of
preliminary bombardments, which had opened on the 15th, were
thoroughly abreast of things. They began by catching No. 2
Company coming up to Bleuet Farm in a barrage of gas-shells,
which meant putting on box-respirators in the dark and going ahead
blind. Only one man was knocked out, however. The transport was
gassed late at night on the Elverdinghe road, and held up for two
hours under fumes of lachrymatory and phosgene. But transport is
expected to get in, whatever happens, and the fact that Lieutenant
R. Nutting, its officer, was badly gassed, too, was an incident. From
the official point of view he should have put on his respirator at the
first, which is notoriously easy when rounding up hooded men and
panicky horses. So he suffered. But as he was the only person who
knew where Bleuet Farm might be in that poisonous blackness, he
lay on the mess-cart, and between upheavals, guided the convoy
thither. Next morn, after spending the night in a dug-out, he had to
be carried back to the dressing-station. That same night 2nd
Lieutenant Lofting, while on patrol along the canal bank, was slightly
wounded in the leg.
The next three days were one nightmare of stores of all kinds for
the battle-dumps pouring into the front line while the platoons there
stacked and sorted them out, under continuous fire. Our hourly
increasing force of heavies (the field-guns were not yet called upon)
took as much of the burden off our men as they could, but the enemy
were well set and knew just what they had to bowl at. The front-line
companies’ work was to repair a very great deal of trench damage;
make assembly-trenches for the coming attack; pile up the dumps,
praying that the next salvo would not send them all sky-high, and
keep the crawling communication-lines clear of corpses, wreckage,
wounded and traffic blocks.
The Diary puts it all in these cold words: “Some of the carrying-
parties under N.C.O.’s did very fine work under fire. In no case did
any party fail to perform the work set it.” Other pens have described
that tour as “house-moving in Hell.” They lost men in the dark who
were not missed till morning. On the night of the 18th, probably
through a misreading of the many lights which were going up
everywhere and might have been read as SOS’s, our big guns
suddenly put down a bitter barrage just behind the German front line.
They replied by one just behind ours, and a searching bombardment
round our wretched Battalion Headquarters. One shell went through
the roof of an officer’s dug-out in No. 1 Company trench and killed
Lieutenant James (he had joined the Battalion, for the second time,
not a month ago) and 2nd Lieutenant Wilson, only a few weeks
joined. Lieutenant Paget was also wounded in the knee. The
casualties among the men were heavy also; and next night, as our
field-guns came into play, a “short” from one of them killed an
irreplaceable C.S.M.—Grimwood of No. 4 Company—which on the
eve of engagement is equivalent to losing an officer.
On the morning of the 20th, No. 4 Company sent out four raiding
parties across the canal bank to see how strongly the enemy was
holding things, and, quaintly enough, to “accustom them to our
temporary occupation of their front line.” The inventive Hun had
managed to raise the water level of the canal, and two of the parties
had to abandon the attempt altogether. The others, led by their
sergeants, floundered across, sometimes up to their chins, found the
enemy line held, and came back with useful news and no casualties,
for which their corps commander and their brigadier congratulated
them. On the afternoon of the same day, the C.O. (Byng-Hopwood)
and Second in Command (Stephen Bruton) of the 1st Coldstream
came up to look at the line, and were both killed by the same shell in
a communication-trench.
On the 21st, at the discomfortable hour before earliest dawn, our
R.E. Company began to send over gas from four-inch Stokes

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