return RUFUS KING (1755-1827) by Gilbert Stuart (1755-1828) Rufus King was among the most persuasive orators at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. After serving as United States senator from New York, he was America's minister to Great Britain from 1796 to 1803. This portrait was commissioned later in his life as part of an exchange between King and his lifelong friend and political ally Christopher Gore. On seeing the finished portrait, Gore wrote to his friend: "We have been highly gratified with your Picture. It is a good Picture, and on the whole a Likeness, though I think in this Respect subject to some Criticism one Eye is drawn down as to give, in a small Degree, the appearance of squinting." The portrait exchange was completed when John Trumbull painted a portrait of Gore for King. Oil on striated panel, 1820 National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution Acquisition made possible by a generous contribution from the James Smithson Society NPG.88.1 return