This concerns the books used by General Rainsford, who despite spending time in France, procured the Etteilla volumes from a French emigré in London, via a local bookseller, in 1793.
According to Rainsford:
The identity of this man of letters is not given, although it may be possible to hazard a guess. Of the 40,000 French emigrés based in London, how many could be reasonably described as "a Gentleman of Literature," implying both nobility and a literary vocation? It is true that many of the exiled French dignitaries, military men or prelates wrote books, but this must be considered as being secondary to their primary calling. There are, however, a small number of exceptions.It has been published at Paris at different Times in small Pamphlets, recompiled afterwards in 2 small 8vo. Volumes accompanied by the cards, & were sold in London by a French Gentleman of Literature who came to London in 1793 to escape Persecution to an eminent Bookseller [of] Charing Cross of whom I bought the Work – and amused myself in considering it. It is called, The Recreation of the Game of Tarots By Etteilla.
One possible candidate is François Hingant de la Tiemblais, former counsellor in the Parliament of Brittany, companion of misfortune to the exiled writer Chateaubriand. Both men, aristocrats reduced to menial literary endeavours and teaching roles, shared the miseries of exile, indigence and illness, and would quite probably have exchanged their books for a few shillings to stave off hunger. Hingant, described by the Romantic author as a fellow writer, is also described as believing in magnetism and the theories of Swedenborg, and was moreover a member of a Masonic lodge in Dinan (see links below).
Hingant’s archives may yet provide further answers.
https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Mémoires ... Livre_VIII
https://www.persee.fr/doc/abpo_0399-082 ... _81_1_2718
https://books.openedition.org/pusl/11355?lang=en