Note that apart from rows and columns there is a number of channels and type. When it is clear what type is, the channels can act as an extra dimension as in CV_8UC3 so you would address a matrix as
uchar a = M.at<Vec3b>(y, x)[i];
So the size in terms of elements of elementary type is M.rows * M.cols * M.cn
To find the max element one can use
Mat src;
double minVal, maxVal;
minMaxLoc(src, &minVal, &maxVal);