Hi Mary, Technically, both of these sentences are correct. 1. The villagers saw the fire burning brightly in the distance. When they hurried there, they found some houses burnt to the ground already. -- In this sentence, 'burnt to the ground (already)' is describing 'some houses', kind of like a very long adjective. 2. The villagers saw the fire burning brightly in the distance. When they hurried there, they found some houses had been burnt to the ground already. -- This sentence uses the past perfect passive, 'had been burnt'. To make the sentence active, the last part could be rewritten, 'Someone had burnt the houses already.' So 'burnt' here is a verb, not an adjective like the other sentence. I hope that helps! Let me know if you have any questions. Best, Julie