Her final and fiercest ambition was social power.

She married her daughter to the only son and namesake of Lucius Quintus Severence.

The pretensions of aristocracy would soon collapse under the feeble hands of born aristocrats were it not for two things--the passion of the masses of mankind for looking up, and the frequent infusions into aristocratic veins of vigorous common blood.
Cornelia Bowker, born Lard, adored "birth." In fulfilling her third ambition she had herself born again.

From the moment of the announcement of her daughter's engagement to Lucius Severence, she ceased to be Lard or Bowker and became Severence, more of a Severence than any of the veritable Severences.

Soon after her son-in-law and his father died, she became so much THE Severence that fashionable people forgot her origin, regarded her as the true embodiment of the pride and rank of Severence--and Severence became, thanks wholly to her, a synonym for pride and rank, though really the Severences were not especially blue-blooded.
She did not live with her widowed daughter, as two establishments were more impressive; also, she knew that she was not a livable person--and thought none the worse of herself for that characteristic of strong personalities.