Fujieda station was one of the important transportation points on the Tokaido.

On this road, many people, horses and goods were constantly coming and going. During the long journey it was not only people but also horses that needed rest, which made it a common practice to change horses at stations. In the image workers are unloading baggage from a tired horse - with another standby horse waiting as replacement.

Hiroshige depicted the full of life scene in detail; from left - a man with Japanese smoking pipe, a half naked man wiping the sweat with ‘tenugui’ Japanese towel, a man fixing his hairband, a man calculating the fee with an abacus, and so on.

On the right, a man sitting on the high platform is talking with another man - probably giving some instructions. The reason why he is sitting in such high place is that even a person riding on horseback didn’t have to get off to do business with him.

The horse in the foreground being unloaded has a black cloth on its flank. Hiroshige wrote the publisher’s family name ’Takeuchi’ on the cloth. He also wrote ‘Hoeido’ - the publishing company name - on the board attached on the luggage seen in the center.

This image conveys the vivid scene so well that we almost feel the air of excitement!