Mie theory has been used to calculate the extinction of a gold nanoparticle in water by varying its diameter from 1 to 1000 nm. Utilizing this size-dependent theoretical spectrum, we have calculated the extinction spectrum of a colloidal gold by taking into account the size distribution of particle. Such calculation is in better agreement with experiment than the calculation without considering the size distribution. A least-squares fitting is used to deduce the size distribution from an experimental extinction spectrum. For particles with their diameters ranging from 10 to 28 nanometers, the fitting gives reasonable agreement with the size distribution obtained from tunneling electron microscope images.