The Orange Free State protested, and no doubt the action of the British Government was rather high-handed, and in rare contrast to the abnegatory policy usually pursued. Finally, the claims of the Orange Free State were settled by Lord Carnarvon, who in 1876 awarded to its government the sum of £90,000 in consideration of the abandonment of their contention. In 1845 Natal had been annexed to Cape Colony, but later on in the same year it was given a separate administration, consisting of a Lieutenant-Governor and an executive Council; though in legal matters it still remained dependent on Cape Town. In 1848 a local Legislative Council was created, and finally in 1856 the colony was entirely severed from the Cape, and was endowed with a partially representative government. Some years previously the Governor of Cape Colony had been also created H.M. High Commissioner in South Africa, so that he might have power to represent the British Government outside the limits of Cape Colony. In this capacity therefore he continued to retain some authority over the government of Natal and its relations with the adjoining states. (The influence of the High Commissioner now extends over all South and Central Africa under the British flag, except, at present, the Protectorate of Nyasaland; in other words, over Rhodesia, the South African Union, Bechuanaland, Basutoland, and Swaziland.) The territory of Natal was not capable for some time of any great extension, being girt about with Boer states and negro tribes whose independence was to some extent guaranteed by the Imperial Government. But in 1866 it received back a small territory on the south (the county of Alfred), which was within the original limits claimed by the founders of Natal, but had been for a time handed over to a Pondo chief. The settled government of Natal and the kindly attitude of the British Colonial Government brought about the repeopling of that fertile country by Kafir tribes.