[Bernard Marx]

Expansion cracks? I see them everywhere...

No, it's a river's main channel and tributary channels running into it. In the spring run-off those channels carry lots of water. The erosive power of water is simply awesome. Over time it can and does wear away entire mountain ranges.

[Fred Nerks]

Upon graduation he took a professional detour into the law, completing a circuit throughout rural England where he could observe geology. As his eyesight began to fail him during long hours focusing on legal briefs he in turn adopted geology as a full time profession...

Figures, the father of uniformitanarism was blind and never left England. (pity Lyell didn't have Google Earth!)