Casting a Matrix object as a single dimensional array

[Chidambaram Annamalai]

I am writing C++ code to manipulate Matrix objects using the octave
headers. I want to copy it to the GPU, for which I require a pointer
to the underlying chunk of memory the Matrix object stores its data
in. Is there a way to do this?

If I cannot get the pointer (due to private visibility mode etc. or
otherwise) what's the most efficient (in terms of least amount of
memory copies) way to do this?

I hope there's a better way than creating my own vanilla array and
copying the elements of the matrix because the matrices are very large
in size.

Thanks,
Chillu